Exponents
by Cassix
Summary: "You know, Allen, our problems are like exponents. No matter what situation we're in, they're bound to just multiply by themselves again..." Laven. Slightly altered timeline. Weird plot, but hopefully will provide some laughs at least.
1. Accidents Happen

**Hey! This is my first fanfic in forever, so I'm sorry it's not very good. This is based off of a story my friend and I came up with on the fly one day on Skype, and surprisingly it fit really well considering the hilarious er... experiments that go on in the Science Department. :D Anyway, I hope you guys enjoy it. C:**

**This fic will be mainly in Lavi's point of view. Also, this story contains yaoi (Laven). Kinda. It's not THAT bad. It's more like a Bromance if anything. Hahaha. :D**

**Disclaimer: I do not own D. Gray-Man. *sad face***

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><p><strong>Chapter One: Accidents Happen<strong>

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><p>Three weeks. <em>Three. Freaking. Long. Boring. WEEKS. <em>I've had to endure three long, missionless weeks waiting for the Order to fix my hammer (not to mention at least an hour of that Old panda biting my head off for busting it in the first place. Hey, it's not _completely_ my fault for giving it my all during the Ark dilemma. I _am _awesome after all). After finally getting the a-okay to go out into the battlefield again, I quickly bolt out of the science department room into the halls of the Order. Before my brain could catch up to my body - my deliciously sexy body, might I add - I see a flash of white collide with my flashy redheadedness.

"God damn it - OW!" I hiss in pain, rubbing the sore spot on my head. Ooh, that's not gonna look too pretty...

"Urgh, what the heck, Lavi? Why are you in such a hurry?" The road block asked with obvious surprise in his voice. I open my eyes - er, eye - to see _just _the person I needed.

"Oh hey, Sprout! What's up?" I beamed a bright smile.

"It's Allen," the white haired boy sighed in irritation to the nickname he had yet to grow (hehehe, pun...) used to,"And nothing much. I was actually on my way to see you."

"_Really?_ You were looking for me?" A mock surprised gasp escaped my lips as I stood up,"Has my awesomeness finally gotten to you, Allen? Does it entice you? Call to you? Would like an autog-"

"No," the blunt, one word answer cut through me like Kanda would have done to me if he found out I ate the last of his soba the other night (only with less death),"I was wondering if you wanted to go train with me for a bit to get you back into the swing of things. It _has _been three weeks after all, and you've been pretty bummed out lately..." He frowned, recalling how he was victim to most of my complaining. Shoving that funny little expression of his aside, I smiled again,"Sure, Sprout, that'd be awesome! C'mon, let's go!" Before the boy could retort, I grabbed him by the hand and dragged him down the hall to our usual training area.

Ah, man, the Order can be so much fun sometimes. Well, at least _now_ it can. It wasn't until Beansprout showed up that I actually really decided to open up to people here. I know it's against the 'Bookman's Guide to Living,' but dang it, it's so hard_ not_ to get attached to these people. Especially Allen. That kid's got some sort of magic stuffed up in his pants or something, because no matter what i tell myself as "Bookman Jr.," there's always a separate voice talking as "Lavi" that makes me feel... happy? Nah, something else. Comforted? No, I'm not a pansy, I don't need comforting like that...

"Lavi?"

Hm, what's the word I'm looking for...? _What the hell, brain, you start off a nice poetic monologue, then you go and stumble over your own vocabulary?_

"Lavi! Earth to Lavi!"

At home? Nope, still not there...

"DAMN IT, STUPID BUNNY, ANSWER ME!" I flinch and flail my arms in the air and shout every ninja-like sound effect I know off of the top of my head as I realize someone's verbally attacking me. Blinking and realizing I'm not dead (whoo!), I relax a little bit and look to my right to see Kanda glaring daggers at me. _Darn, the ninja caught me..._

"Something wrong, Yuu?" I asked with my usual smile. Kanda didn't seem to be wearing his happy face today, as his eye-daggers were still jabbing at my subconscious.

"Yeah, is there a reason why you just decided to barge in here and stand behind me like some sort of creep? That smile's starting to burn itself into my brain and I really don't need that crap on my mind. And why are you holding that Beansprout's hand like that?" He finally stopped looking at me and directed his eyes at Allen, who was right there with him and glaring back.

"I'm not a beansprout, BaKanda. My name is Allen Walker."

"Like I care," Sighing away the rude reply, Allen continued, letting go of my hand at the same time.

"Look, Lavi and I just wanted to train for a little bit. Wanna stop being a jerk long enough for that?" Kanda rolled his eyes and stood up, grabbing Mugen as he did. He glared at me and Allen one last time before leaving with a loud and annoyed "Che." Once Kanda left, Allen looked up at me with a triumphant smile, making me smile twice as brightly. _D'aww, he's so adorable!_

Next thing I know, I'm seeing stars and I feel a wall stabbing me in the back... _What the heck just happened?_

"Someone's losing their touch," I hear Allen say from a distance, a smile in his words. I look up and see he'd punched me and sent me into a wall across the room. _Ouch._

"Oi, you coulda said 'Start' first, Sprout!" I whined as I got my hammer ready for battle. Allen just laughed at me and smiled as if he did nothing wrong. _Damn him and his innocent little-_

Wow, I'm really out of it today... I went to swing my hammer at him, but I ended up miscalculating my strength (ah, too strong for my own good. Bad me, bad me!) and threw my hammer instead...

"My bad, Allen!" Yeah. My bad. The kid fell to the ground, and now he's not moving! _CRAP. CRAP. OH GOD NO. Okay, it's alright, I got this. All I gotta do is get him to wake up... But how? Aw, dang it... Uh, I need help. Who should I ask? Kanda? Nah, I don't need him making Beansprout Sushi outta poor little Allen. Lenalee? No no no, I don't wanna hear her lecture me... _In an act of desperation, I shook the white haired exorcist's shoulder,"A-Allen...? You in there, kiddo? Hey, c'mon wake up, I didn't hit you that hard, did I...? U-Uh..." I scoured my brain for some way to wake him up, but absolutely _nothing_ came to mi- "ALLEN! WAKE UP! IT'S LUNCH TIME!" I shouted in his face, cupping my mouth as I did,"COME ON! LUNCH-TIME. LET'S GO!" I waited a couple seconds... I saw him fidget, I think, but that coulda been me as I fidgeted impatiently waiting for a response. I sighed, then picked up the boy as fast (and gently, of course...h-hehe...) as I could and bolted out of the training hall. I looked around for someone who could help me, but because of my amazingly awesome luck, no one was around.

"Lavi?" I heard a voice call from behind me as I ran. As I skidded to a halt, I turned on my heel and ran back to the voice calling my name. It was Komui, holding his special bunny cup full of coffee.

"Komui! Thank _god_, I need your help! Allen," I shrugged my shoulder, which made Allen move a little as his head was resting on it,"kinda got in an...accident... of sorts. Yeah. And he's unconscious and nothing I do to wake him up is working!" The Supervisor examined the boy on my back, his lips pressed in a firm line as he thought to himself. I stood there anxiously waiting for him to help me get this kid off my back. I wonder if I would get a hunchback for standing like this too long... Man, that would really suck. Hunchbacks are really unattractive according to the ladies, and I don't wanna ruin my image. I'm too sexy to let that happe-

"Lavi, are you coming?"

"What?" Man, I gotta work on not holding conversations with myself in my head. I think it's gonna get me in trouble one day... Nah, that doesn't happen to me. I'm Lavi Bookman Jr.

"Bring Allen to my science lab and I'll have a look at him. I needed to talk to you and him anyway, so this is actually pretty convenient." I nodded and followed him to the lab, a sudden chill running down my spine. I couldn't tell if it was intuition or Allen drooling on me. I really hope it was intuition. Once we got to the lab, Komui put his coffee down on a table beside quite a large array of various tools and sharp things. _I'm starting to wonder if this is safe or not... _"Set Allen down on that chair over there. The preparation won't take too long." I did as I was told, then I sat in the chair next to Allen's and watched him in case he woke up. He looked pretty peaceful, despite that nasty knot on the top of his head from my hammer- ...Oh, _shit,_ my hammer. Guess I know where I'm going after all this.

"So uh, how do you plan on waking him up?" I asked to get my mind off of losing my Innocence in the midst of all the mayhem (pfft, anyone else think that sounds a little wrong? I just got that).

"I'll be running some examinations and possibly drawing some blood for testing." I choked a little hearing that last part.

"D-Drawing blood? Why?"

"I'm just about to explain," he hummed and went to the back corner of the room. He removed a cloth from some sort of mysterious object and stepped back and pointed at said object proudly,"BEHOLD! My newest Komurin edition." He beamed. I swear, I think I see sparkles floating around him.

"U-Uh... Another Komurin? Really?" I rolled my eye and sighed,"Are you sure this one's safe? Like, a hundred percent safe?" Komui nodded and patted the metallic machine, a soft _clang_ echoing from its exterior.

"Yep! This is actually part of a new experiment I wanted to try out, and I thought Allen would be the perfect test subject," His eyes glistened with mischief and I felt that same cold shiver of intuition run down my spine,"To do this experiment however, I'm going to need a sample of his DNA, and I thought a blood sample would do just fine. The only problem I'm having with this is I'm going to need another sample from a different person..."

I don't think I've ever stood up out of a chair faster. I flinched when I heard something topple over from how fast I stood up, too. Hm... My curiosity is a dangerous thing. I should really have a nice little talk with myself about proper behavi- Nah. I don't feel like it,"I'd be more than happy to help. I'm a little curious about what this experiment is..." Komui smiled from ear to ear and sat me down in the chair again.

"Thank you! Now if you'll just relax here, I'll go get the Komurin set up," I nodded and watched as he went over to the machine and rolled it to the center of the lab and opened the back. He flipped a few switches, and then pressed a button on the top of its head. With a rhythmic hum, the Komurin's eye light lit up and it came to life, looking around as if it were examining its surroundings. As annoyed as I was with these damned robots, I've kinda always found them interesting in a way. I think it was the flashing lights, but I wasn't completely sure... I watched as the lights on the front side of the robot's body flashed and flickered as it responded to Komui's commands. _Yeah, it's definitely the flashing lights._

"So uh, what do you want me to do?" I asked, watching the Komurin advance toward me. I felt my spine tingle again. Komui just chuckled and pushed his glasses back up the bridge of his nose.

"Just sit back and relax as best you can..." he said darkly, making me question why the hell I agreed to any of this in the first place. I turned my head to the Komurin on my right (damn blind side...) and the next thing I know, a quick pain shoots into my arm as the robot injects a needle into it. I winced a little as it drew blood, but it ended as soon as it started. The robotic arm withdrew into the machine, then it drew blood from Allen with the remaining arm and retracted as it finished. Komui smiled and chuckled to himself, then moved Komurin back.

"Alright, now what?" I questioned as I stared at the Chinese man flipping switches and pressing buttons behind the machine. He didn't answer, so I stood up and followed him behind the machine. Before I could even make it all the way behind it though, it freaking roared and shook, scaring the ever-loving life out of me,"What the hell is it doing, Komu- UMMFFRGH!" I found myself on the floor with a really warm thing on my face... A kinda squishy thing on my face... I picked it up and saw it was a kid, but not just ANY kid - it looked like an eight year old mini-me! My jaw dropped and he almost did too when I realized what that machine just did,"You made a child out of my and Allen's DNA?" The kid flinched at the loud voice and hit me on the head.

"Why do you sound like you're disgusted, daddy?" The kid frowned. I blinked and looked at him sitting in my lap. He had my kind of hair, but there was a very prominent section of his hair that was snow white. The hair was kept back by a headband similar to mine (wait a minute, this thing was born with clothes? That's kinda awesome...), and the remaining bangs that were in his face almost completely covered his eyes. His right eye was my shade of green, but his left eye was Allen's shade of gray-blue. I blushed lightly as I looked at the kid's face. _This guy's definitely got Allen's face shape. It's too cute for his own good..._

"I-I'm not disgusted, just...surprised," I smiled sheepishly. The kid blinked, then smiled and hugged me. I blushed more and hugged him back, though it was a little awkward since Komui was standing there staring right at me. He chuckled deviously.

"Wanna try for a daughter next?" He smirked with a hint of amusement in his voice. I glared at him and stood up, setting my apparent son aside.

"If there's gonna be a second kid of mine, I'm gonna be the one to press the button damn it," I cringed a little as I replayed what I said in my head, then I turned to the little kid,"S-Sorry. Don't say bad words, it's not good for you to do that." He just smirked at me with an amused look in his eyes, then sat on the chair next to Allen and examined him curiously, not paying me any mind (the little brat). Taking a deep breath, I turned back to the Komurin and pressed the button. It roared to life again and shook as it worked its magic. Almost as fast as the first kid came, the second one popped out of the Komurin's midsection door. If I weren't a man, I would've squealed the kid was so freakin' cute. I couldn't keep the goofy smile off of my face though, and I went and picked up my second kid. It was a boy, and he definitely looked more like me than the last one. He had my red hair again (score!) and Allen's gray-blue eyes. He looked more like I did as a kid, but there was one thing that was kind of off about him...

"Why does this one have freckles?" I looked at Komui, a little worried. He just shrugged in response.

"Well, that depends on your heritage. As far as I know, Allen's family doesn't have any records of freckles. Does yours?" I thought about it, then I shrugged,"I actually don't remember much about my family's history. Haha, ironic huh?" Komui couldn't help but chuckle at my idiocy, but the fact kind of stung me on the inside. Just then, the first kid started tugging on the bottom of my shirt, demanding my attention.

"Daddy, aren't you going to name us?" He frowned, as if disapproving of his father's fatherly behavior. Feeling like quite a big failure at the moment, I knelt down and hugged him tightly.

"Don't worry, kiddo, I'll give ya a name right now! One for you and your brother!" I beamed a wide smile, and they happily returned it back to me. _Oh my god, these kids are too freaking cuuuuuuuute! _"Hmm, what to name you, what to name you..." I thought for a minute, but no name came to mind. I wanted a really good one for my first ever child,"Jesus, I don't know..."

"Jesus? Is my name Jesus?" His bi-colored eyes looked at me with such excitement I just didn't have the heart to tell him no.

"Y-Yeah! Jesus is your name," I nodded. He triumphantly punched the air with his tiny fist, then wrapped his arms around my neck and gave me a hug.

"My name is Jesus! That's awesome!" He looked at his little brother that was still in my arms, then looked at me,"What's his name?" I thought for a minute then chuckled to myself.

"Pablo. That's his name."

"Ohhh, hiya Pablo! I'm Jesus," my first son said with a sweet smile. His little brother, who looked to be about seven years old, responded with a smile and a wave. I smiled and went to stand up, but I ended up tripping and hitting the Komurin on accident, knocking it into the table that had Komui's coffee mug on it.

_Shit._

You guessed it, the coffee spilled off the table and onto the Komurin, causing it to short circuit and go out of control. Next thing I know, a loud robotic roar sounded and more children came piling out into the room. Komui cursed under his breath and quickly grabbed a marker and started writing numbers on the shoulders of the children's clothes.

"Lavi, why'd you do that? My beautiful Komuriiiiiiiiin!" He cried as he tried desperately to catch up with the children coming out of the machine. When I looked at the last number he wrote, he was already up to the fifties. All the color drained from my face as I saw all the mini-me's crowded up in the room. My eye looked around desperately for a way to stall and help Komui out, and I trudged through the sea of children to the door and swung it open. I looked down at Jesus, who was confused and curiously looking at his new brothers and sisters.

"Oi, Jesus! Lead your siblings out of here and wait outside!" I called to him and gently pushed him out of the door with Pablo desperately following behind him. He nodded, then called to his siblings.

"Hey, guys! Follow the leader!" The large mass of children replied with happy cheers and one-by-one, they marched behind Jesus into the halls of the Order. Another goofy smile was plastered on my face as I watched them all march away, then I felt something hit me on the back of the head. I turned around, and it was none other than the white haired exorcist himself.

"Lavi, what the heck is going on? Why are there a bunch of children coming out of a machine? And why do they all look like me and you?" His eyes were riddled in fear and confusion, but I didn't have any time to explain to him. I sighed and pushed Allen outside with the kids.

"Just make sure the kids don't get lost!" Bad idea. The little sprout was definitely bound to get lost with them,"No wait! Lead them to the cafeteria! I'll meet you there!" He looked at me funny, but nodded and ran after the line of kids down the hall. After making sure Allen turned the right corner, I turned back to Komui who was still numbering the many kids pouring out of the machine.

"One hundred fifty-three...One hundred fifty-four..." Komui panted as he was exhausted trying to make sure he didn't lose count. I made my way over to him, gently directing the emerging kids to follow the ones in front of them to the cafeteria. Once I made it to the Komurin, I tore off the door on its back and tried flipping every switch in there to shut it off. I must have failed though, because all I did was speed up the pace of the ever-flowing river of my machine-made babies. Komui screamed in panic as his hand raced to catch up with the pace of kids. Soon it got to the point of them waiting in line to get marked with a number, which I found to be quite adorable and hilarious at the same time.

"Sorry, Chief! I'm trying to shut this thing off!" I reassured, but all I heard was number after number. Before I went back to switch-flipping, I heard Komui call out,'Two hundred ninety-seven, lead Two hundred ninety-eight and Two hundred ninety-nine out of the room!'

In about ten minutes, I finally got the dang machine to shut off and the last child to pop out was an adorable little girl, at most the age of three, in a pink and white dress. She had really long white hair that had to have reached down to her knees and her eyes were big bright orbs of a pure teal. A light blush colored my cheeks as I smiled at my last daughter. She looked so innocent and pure, she looked more like a little doll than a human girl. Komui sighed and wrote down her number on the shoulder of her dress, then capped the marker and fell to his knees in exhaustion.

"Three hundred twenty-four..." he huffed and looked at Lavi,"You. Are a crazy kid. Why'd you want so many kids, huh?" I glared at him and kicked him upside the head.

"Stupid, you're the one who just HAD to have your coffee RIGHT THERE for the machine to knock over! Besides, I didn't ask for any of this in the first pl-" My rant was cut off by a small whimper and I immediately felt my heart shrivel and sink to the bottom of my chest as I saw my little girl start to cry,"Ack! I'm sorry, baby, I didn't mean to scare you!" I picked her up in my arms and stroked her hair, trying to calm her down, but she kept on crying. I sighed,"I might as well get going. I'm sure Allen's having a hard time explaining this to everyone in the cafeteria." Komui didn't even hear me, as he was busy mourning over the loss of his beautiful Komurin. I shook my head and just left, trying to come up with a good way to explain this all to everyone, especially to Allen.

_Accidents happen, I guess?_

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><p><strong>FINALLY, I FINISHED! Whoo, this is a really long chapter. I'm sorry you guys had to sit through my crappy writing, I know I'm not the best author out there. D: I hope you at least got a laugh out of it. I know the story sounds really messed up, but this whole thing did start off as an inside joke to begin with.<strong>

**PLEASE REVIEW! I'd really like to hear your opinions on this so far. Let me know if there's anything I need to improve or if I'm doing a good job or if I just flat out fail at life, hahaha. Lots of love to you guys, see ya next chapter (if there's going to be one, it's all up to you). 3**


	2. A Whole New Family

**Long time no see, guys! Thank you all so much for the reviews. I was surprised to see such enthusiastic opinions on my writing. Anyway, here's the second chapter, and I hope you guys enjoy it!**

**WARNING: This story contains yaoi (Laven). It's not too bad. It's more of a Bromance if anything at all.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own D. Gray-Man. *sadface***

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><p><strong>Chapter Two: A Whole New Family<strong>

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><p>"-And that's exactly what happened," I finished with a very confident nod. I closed my eye as I smiled this time, hoping to ignore all of the soul-burning stares around me (and not all of them were from the three hundred twenty-four kids).<p>

"Let me get this straight..." Allen sighed for the umpteenth time and held child number three hundred twenty-four in his lap as he continued,"After you knocked me out with your hammer-"

"Which I never did get back by the way," I sniffled. Allen glared at me for interrupting, so I shut my mouth again. _Man, he REALLY doesn't look too amused._

"After you knocked me out, you went to Komui - of ALL the people in the Black Order - to help me?"

"Well... He was the first person I ran into!"

"That doesn't mean it was the right person to run into!" He had a very good point there,"And besides, why didn't you leave when you saw the Komurin? Haven't you learned that a Komurin is a sign something bad is gonna happen?" I frowned, then picked up Pablo from the little group of kids sitting on the floor and nuzzled him.

"Whaddya mean something _bad _happened? These are my children, and they're absolutely adorable! Who _wouldn't _want a bunch of mini-me's running around, huh?" I beamed another smile, but it certainly wasn't returned. Allen's eye twitched in irritation. I could tell he was holding back from pulling a Kanda on my sorry ass...

"You seem to be forgetting one rather important detail, Lavi Bookman Jr..." _Oh shit, he used my full name! Sad face! _"Your three hundred something kids... Are also MY three hundred something kids. Do you know what that means?" A very deadly silence followed his question, and I could tell he really wanted an answer. I swallowed back a lump in my throat, but it wouldn't go down.

"U-Um... One of us has to be the mommy?" Suddenly there was another deadly silence that completely dominated the last one. Even the kids could tell something was up, and they all stared at me with their green eyes, gray-blue eyes, or some odd combination of the two. Allen just sat across from me glaring daggers at me.

"Yes. And you know why that's gonna be a problem?" The anger started building up in his voice, and for some reason it really hurt me on the inside. I don't know why it hurt so much, I've annoyed Allen plenty of times in the past, but... this felt different. I don't like it at all.

"Um... We're both guys?"

"WE'RE BOTH GUYS," He repeated back to me twice as loudly. Our white haired daughter flinched from his voice and covered her ears desperately trying to avoid her father's (or mother's?) blind fury,"Do you know how WRONG it is for two guys to have kids? It's not even POSSIBLE! How are we gonna deal with all of them? They can barely even fit in the cafeteria right now!" He pointed to the vast ocean of children filling every possible inch of floor space of the cafeteria and a great deal of them were even sitting on the tables or in people's laps watching Allen yell at me,"I didn't even ask for any of this. How do you expect us to take care of all of them, huh?" I frowned and rested my chin on Pablo's head and stared at the ground distancing me from Allen. As if to fill the silent tension, the daugher in Allen's arms started whimpering and crying again. Jesus carefully weaved his way through all of his siblings to her and took her in his arms, petting her head. He looked at Allen, his eyes riddled in guilt.

"Do you..not want us anymore?" Allen just stared at Jesus with mixed emotions. He forced a smile on his face, but his eyes stayed the same. Lowering his head, he placed a hand on Jesus' head and ruffled his hair gently.

"It's not that..." Allen muttered quietly, but because of the eerie silence in the cafeteria, he was loud enough for everyone to hear,"I just... I don't know how we're going to be able to keep all of you." I could hear it clearly in his voice. _He doesn't want this..._ I swallowed back another lump in my throat, but again, it wouldn't go away. I held Pablo to me and I could feel him shaking in my arms. I looked down at him and I could see him crying. _Shit... What the hell have I done?_

"Allen," a voice called from behind me. I turned around and saw Lenalee walking up to us holding a set of twins. They had brown hair, and the girl of the two had green eyes while the boy had navy blue eyes. The girl squirmed out of Lenalee's grip and hopped onto the table. She looked at Allen and beamed.

"Auntie Lenalee can help take care of us! She's really really nice!" she exclaimed with loud excitement. Her twin nodded, fiddling with the scarf around his neck.

"Don't forget, we're all technically family here, Allen," Lenalee said with a smile,"I'm sure we wouldn't mind helping you take care of the kids."

"Like hell I'm gonna help raise a bunch of stupid bunnies and beansprouts," Kanda yelled from the corner of the cafeteria. He looked really irritated, and I could definitely see why. He had a circle of kids crowded around him playing with his hair and poking at the shiny buttons of his exorcist uniform. I couldn't help but smile; they really were too cute for their own good...

"Oh, lighten up, Kanda! It won't be as bad as you think it's going to be,"The Chinese girl said as she put the brunette boy down next to Allen,"Besides, I think it'll be a lot of fun having kids around. It'll probably brighten your mood too." Kanda growled and stood up, scaring the children around him.

"These kids aren't going to do anything but get in the way, Lenalee! How are we going to be able to do our jobs if there are snot-nosed brats laying around taking up every possible inch of space?" Just then, the female twin that was standing on the table huffed and pouted hearing Kanda and his rude remark. She bolted down the long table and jumped off, landing right in front of the Japanese samurai.

"We're not as worthless as you think we are, you big old jerk!" And just like that, poor Yuu earned a pretty hard kick to the shin. I busted out laughing of course, but Lenalee just had to hit me on the head and stop my fun,"We might not know how to fight, but we can definitely be a big help if we try!"

"Yeah, Sister number 15 is right!" Jesus exclaimed as he stood next to her with a confident air about him (yeah, he's definitely my son. Just look at that 'I'm-sexy-and-I-know-it' look in his eyes!). Even the little doll-faced girl Jesus still held in his arms seemed to hold a strong expression on her fragile looking face. Kanda just glared at the attacker and growled curses under his breath, but he knew better than to attack a couple of kids. Lenalee stepped up and placed a hand on the children's shoulders.

"We really can't risk you guys getting hurt. The Order isn't a place for kids, unfortunately..." She trailed off seeing the sad faces of my kids (I feel her pain),"B-But I'm sure we can find something here for you guys to do to help." She stood up straight and looked around,"I'm sure a big portion of us wouldn't mind a few extra assistants, right?" From another corner of the room, I could hear Reever and Johnny silently cheering to themselves,'Yes! We neeed the help!' _And you guys thought my kids couldn't do anything. Pfeh._

"What can I do, Auntie Lenalee? Huh?" The brunette girl bounced up and down excited awaiting her first job. Soon the other little kids joined in on the bouncing and excitement.

"Jeez, these guys copy each other quite a lot. They remind me of exponents..." I chuckled to myself watching the excited little kids get to know the friendly people in the Order. Allen laughed with me.

"Wanna call them Exponents then?" He joked. I took him seriously of course and agreed to it. He looked at me funny, but I didn't really care.

"Speaking of which, we still need to name all of you guys..." I trailed off as I looked at the little group of children sitting with Allen and me,"I already named two of them. Jesus! Pablo! Come over here for a minute!" On command, the older two sons came trudging through the sea of Exponents to their father and maybe-mother.

"What's up, Dad?" Jesus asked me, still holding Exponent 324 in his arms.

"You named our first child Jesus..." Allen said in disbelief, staring at said child. Jesus looked back at him and blinked, then smiled brightly.

"Mommy is really pretty!" He chimed innocently. I couldn't have laughed harder, and in almost two seconds after I let out my first chuckle, Allen hit me upside the head.

"That's not funny, Lavi!"

"Sure it is, _Mother,_" I sang with a slight smirk on my face. Allen's cheeks became colored with a light blush and he pouted, making me smirk more. Pablo laughed at us, but I'm not entirely sure why.

"A-Anyway..." Allen sighed, changing the subject,"We do need to start naming these kids... But there's no way we can come up with three hundred twenty-two names by ourselves." He looked at Lenalee and the others that stood beside us. They seemed to catch his drift and their faces brightened almost immediately. Jesus laughed, then stood on a table after handing over his sister to Allen.

"Hey, everyone, listen up!" He shouted and rose his hand. Suddenly the cafeteria's soft hum of voices went silent in a smooth wave. I smiled brightly watching my son. _Aw, he's such a leader. It makes me so proud! _"Separate yourselves into four groups and stay in a corner of the cafeteria! We're gonna be given names now!" All the kids gasped and cheered happily and instantly ran to the corner closest to them. In about five minutes flat, they were organized in their own little corners and smiling their sweetest smiles waiting to be given a name (good god, if it were humanly possible to melt on the spot, I swear I would have right then and there). With newfound happiness and rekindled fire within me I stood up on the table I was sitting at and ran over to the nearest corner of the cafeteria to name my little kiddies. I swooped up the little brunette girl from earlier and hugged her to me.

"I'ma name you Stacy!" I declared proudly. She smiled my kind of smile and fist pumped.

"Sweet! I get a cute name!" She sang happily and hugged me. I blushed a little and hugged her back. I looked at Allen and gestured for him to come help. He sat there for a minute staring at me dumbfounded. I frowned.

"Allen, c'mon, these are your kids, too. You should help name them," He shook his head no, and I could see from the corner of my eye Stacy frowning disapprovingly.

"324, you should convince Mama to help name us..." She said gently to the little girl in Allen's arms. She responded by blushing and burying her face in Allen's chest, making him chuckle and stroke her hair. Stacy sighed.

"It's okay, ah...Stacy. I'll be over there to help name you guys soon..." He smiled at her, and she nodded.

"Okay then! Hey, twin, do you want Daddy to name you?" Stacy's twin shook his head no and remained seated beside Allen, resting his head on his shoulder. It looks like Allen's already got his little crowd of children playing favorites with him. Two seconds later, I feel a whole bunch of little hands grabbing at my shirt and whining and complaining, all asking when they'll be named. I chuckled and directed my attention back to them. _Being a dad is gonna be a lot of hard work._

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><p>By the time the Black Order had finally finished naming all of their designated groups of children, it was already getting dark. I sighed and laid on the tabletop staring at the ceiling. Stacy had fallen asleep next to me and Jesus was talking to Pablo discussing the snacks Jerry had provided for them. I turned my head to Allen, who was now tying Exponent 324's hair up in pigtails. Smiling to myself, I turned on my side and called to him,"So Sprout, did you finally come up with a name for them?"<p>

"Mhmm."

"And?"

"Gimme a second," He fixed his daughter's ribbons and whispered something to her. She nodded and crawled off of his lap and ran over to a group of her older siblings, gently getting their attention. Moments later, she came back with the group,"I didn't wanna name a whole lot of them, but these are the ones I did get to naming." The white haired exorcist pointed to his little girl,"This is Malissa. She's very quiet and her sense of hearing is very sensitive. She likes pink, and she seems to have a habit of humming or singing to herself." She blushed lightly and hid her face behind the closest sibling to her, Exponent 69 (PFFFFT. Of course Allen would pick that one to name for himself. That sly kid, I KNEW he wasn't completely innocent like that).

"Oh, so you wanted to take the time to get to know the kids before naming them?" I guessed, trying to ignore my nagging thoughts from instigating a laugh. He nodded, then continued his introductions. The next in line was a white haired boy that looked to be about the age of eight, just like Jesus. He had mischievous green eyes like mine, and pale fragile skin like Allen's,"This is Micah, Exponent 69. He's got your personality, along with little traces of my rather sneaky smooth talk," I could've sworn I saw a hint of a dark smile on his face," He's already won Lenalee's heart over it seems. She says he's her favorite out of most of the children." Micah smiled.

"I can't help it, I'm just that sexy." Allen sighed.

"Don't say things like that. Especially with Malissa near you," He scolded. Micah frowned and shoved his hands in his pockets. Allen continued,"And uh, the one standing next to Micah is Yuca, Exponent number 23. She's kinda like me, which is probably why I grew attached to her pretty quickly. She's also an eater, like me," Yuca blushed and laughed a little in embarrassment. She had short white hair with the bangs held back by clips. Her eyes were pale green rather than dark green, and she also had very, _very _faint traces of freckles on her cheeks. She looked like she was about six years old.

"Hmm, I guess all of the children are ranged from about five to eight years old," I said as I examined the children in the cafeteria. Allen nodded, seeming to agree with my observation. Yuca then turned around and pulled Stacy's twin up beside her.

"Hey hey, you should introduce yourself too!" She smiled gently, making the boy blush a little and look away. He tugged at the scarf around his neck and pulled it up to his nose to hide the red on his cheeks. I chuckled and nodded.

"What's your name, kiddo?" He seemed a little hesitant, but he directed his eyes at me. I gave him another smile, but it didn't seem to phase him. He averted his eyes again, an unreadable emotion mixed into the deep shade of blue.

"Neah," he said quietly. Allen nodded, a sheepish smile spreading across his lips.

"I don't know why, but... I wanted to name him Neah," I nodded approvingly. The boy seemed like the shy and reserved type, but judging by the way Malissa clung to him and how he smiled as he hugged her back, he had a very sweet and soft side, too. I chuckled and stood up, then swooped my arms around the kids in a giant hug.

"It's nice to meet you, Malissa, Yuca, Micah, and Neah," They all laughed and squirmed in my embrace. Little Malissa managed to crawl her way out of my hug and crawled back into Allen's lap. I smirked,"She's a mommy's girl."

"I'm not the mom," Allen retorted with a threatening glare.

"But the kids already call me dad. And Jesus _did _say you were rather pretty."

"I'm still not the mom."

"Wanna bet?"

"You're on. I can win in any bet and you know that, Lavi."

"We'll see about that, Sprout." I chuckled and reached in my pocket and pulled out a coin,"We'll flip this coin and decide once and for all who the mom of this relationship is. If it's heads, you're the mom. If it's tails, I'm the mom. You ready?" Allen nodded and the kids cleared a spot on the floor for me to flip the coin. Drawing in a deep breath, I flipped the coin and let it drop the ground with a soft _ting!_ on the hard stone. The kids crowded around the coin to see what it was, obstructing it from my and Allen's vision. The kids giggled to themselves and whispered things back and forth amongst themselves, then picked up the coin and gave it back to me,"W-What? What was it?"

"Hehehe, nothing~" Yuca sang with an amused smile on her face.

"Nothing you need to be concerned with at all," Micah added. He looked at his siblings and winked at them. Almost on cue, they all dispersed and ran to the nearest sibling to them and whispered something. This started a chain reaction of whispers and giggles, and it was starting to worry me. I looked at Allen with a desperate look in my eye.

"Did you see what the coin was?" He shook his head.

"Looks like we're about to find out though," Allen pointed to the kids as they all turned to face me and him. They all had an amused smile on their face, and some were giggling out of control. Lenalee also had a funny look on her face, hell, even Kanda looked like he was enjoying this newfound piece of knowledge.

"Ready guys?" Micah asked as he turned to his siblings. They all nodded,"Alright! One...two... three!" They all drew in a deep breath, then as best they could, they all said in unison something that I know will be burned deep into my brain as one of _the best_ memories I'll ever have in my entire life.

**"We love you, Mama Allen!"**

Allen looked at me with the brightest, reddest blush I've ever seen on him. It could have possibly put my beautiful red hair to shame (nah, too sexy for Allen. Way too sexy). I just sat there and looked back at him, the biggest grin on my face. Suddenly, a thought popped into my head, and that playful smile quickly turned into a devious smirk.

"What are you thinking, Lavi...?" he asked me, noticing the change in my expression. I just chuckled and wrapped an arm around him and hugged him.

"Oh nothing, Sprout~" I chimed with an amused smirk. I looked down at my closest friend in the Black Order and pulled him close enough to whisper something in his ear,_"Who's ya daddy?"_

I may have earned a broken rib or so, but _damn _that expression of his was well worth it.

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><p><strong>This chapter's a bit shorter than the last one, but there wasn't a whole lot to put here. Thank you to those of you who reviewed the last chapter. Again, I wasn't expecting such positive feedback on my writing, but it means a whole lot to me seeing that people enjoy what I write. :) PLEASE: REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW! Also, to those of you who do review, lemme know who your favorite character is so far. You'll see a lot more of the Exponents next chapter, too. See ya later guys! Lots of love! <strong>


	3. Adjusting

**Sorry for the long delay guys. I've been kinda self-conscious of my writing and stuff lately, but I decided to just suck it up and update. Updates will be a little less frequent for me however since we'll be having finals at school soon and I wanna make sure I can dedicate enough time to studying. I'm also trying to find time between that and my webcomic on DeviantArt to update this for you guys, so... I'm quite busy as is. xD**

**Shout-outs to: Chibi Moko-Chan, Elric Lawliet, and DR. EPIC. Thanks for the reviews guys!**

**WARNING: This story contains yaoi (Laven). It's not too bad. It's more of a Bromance if anything at all.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own D. Gray-Man. *sadface***

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><p><strong>Chapter Three: Adjusting<strong>

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><p>"So, Daddy, where are we gonna sleep?" Jesus asked me after he finished dinner. I yawned and pinched the bridge of my nose as I finished the last of tonight's records. I looked back at my son and blinked as I processed his question in my mind. He just stared back at me from the leather chair on the other side of my desk that was swamped with papers in my horrible chicken-scratch handwriting (it's normally quite beautiful, but who wants to put effort in work when you have three hundred and twenty-four kids to play with? They need attention!). He, along with Pablo and about ten other Exponents, stayed with me in the library to keep me company while I worked.<p>

"U-Uh...What?"

"Me and my brothers and sisters were talking earlier and we were wondering where we were gonna sleep... There are a lot of us, and I doubt we'd fit in your and Mama's room," My nose wrinkled at the thought of sharing a room with Allen. Sure, we've slept in the same room before when on akuma hunting missions, but when it comes to a room in the Black Order... It's too much like home to even think about doing that. It'd be way too awkward for me and Beansprout.

"That's a good question actually..." I muttered to myself and stretched in my chair to crack my back. I sighed and stood up,"C'mon, let's go look for Mama and ask her- him what he t-thinks," Unable to keep my slip up to myself I broke out into laughter. Jesus heard me too and smirked a little. _Man, he looks so much like me when he smirks, it's a little scary..._"Don't tell him I said that. He'll kill me," He laughed, then jumped out of his chair and went over to Pablo, who was sitting in front of a bookshelf to the right of my desk. I glanced at the book he was reading, expecting it to be something easy and picture-heavy...

But I was _not _expecting it to be in Spanish.

"Pablo, can you understand Spanish?" I asked him curiously. He looked up at me and nodded with a smile. I felt my heart drop a little. Ever since he was born, Pablo hadn't spoken to me aside from those simple one word answers... Maybe it'll be good for Pablo to learn Spanish. I knew the language - along with about a few _dozen _others_ - _quite fluently, so it definitely wouldn't hurt me in the least. The only problem I could think of would be the verbal barrier between little Pablo and little Allen.

"Don't feel bad, Dad, he doesn't talk to anyone but me," Jesus said as he came back with Pablo and the others. I frowned.

"Yeah, that makes me feel a whole lot better, Jesus," I chuckled. He just smirked and walked out of the library with Pablo trailing behind him with his book. Sighing and running a hand through my hair, I followed the kids.

The only problem was Allen was nowhere to be found. We checked in with the other kids, who were each divided up into smaller groups to hang out with different people in the Order, but they didn't know where he was either. Starting to feel worried I left my group of kids with Lenalee and ran all around the Order looking for my white haired partner (wow, that felt weird to say). While I was running however, I saw a mini flash of pink and white run right in front of me.

"Shhiiii-" I skidded to a stop (both verbally and physically) and stared at little Malissa. She stared back up at me with teal eyes full of happiness and curiosity. I smiled,"What's up, Lisa?" I knelt down and poked her nose (earning the cutest little smile and giggle I've _ever_ heard). She wrinkled her nose and took out her pacifier to speak.

"Playing Hide-and-Seek with Mama," she spoke carefully as she made sure she said everything correctly. I just about melted inside and almost missed everything she said.

"Oh? Can I help you look for he-...him?" I pressed my lips in a firm line to suppress a laugh (although I'm sure my smile wasn't hidden very well). Malissa's eyes sparkled to a whole new level of happiness as she nodded and bounced in place. She pulled my arm and pointed down a hall.

"Dis way! Mama's dis way!" She pulled me down the hall as hard as her little arms could and as fast as her little legs could carry her. As much as I absolutely enjoyed watching my enthusiastic little girl, I really was worried. As we furthered in our venture, I scanned all possible nooks and crannies for the white haired Exorcist, but no matter how hard I looked I couldn't see my little beansprout...

Wait, _my _little beansprout? Why am I suddenly getting possessive? That's weird, I've never really thought of Allen like that. Eh, I guess it's just my daddy senses tingling. I gotta be there for my darling little kids and my wonderful wife (if you can call Allen a wife. HAH!) after all.

Before I could really continue my train of thought, Malissa slowly stopped running to catch her breath, then looked around to see exactly where exactly she ran herself into. Losing my temporary tunnel vision, I also took a good look around. We managed to turn full circle and were in an upper floor of the library of the Black Order. I sighed in slight disappointment. _I'm not getting anywhere with this, and it's ALL for the sake of answering a simple question..._ I pinched the bridge of my nose as I thought to myself, then felt Malissa tug on my sleeve again.

"Lookie! It's Timmy!" She exclaimed excitedly and pointed to a bookshelf not far from us. I raised an eyebrow and followed her pointed finger to see a golden ball with wings and a long tail walking along the top of the bookcase on its four stubby little legs. As if responding to Malissa's observation, Timcanpy flicked his tail and flapped his wings eagerly. Malissa giggled and ran over to him,"Timmy, help find Mama! Help find Mama!" She jumped up as high as she could to reach the floating golem. He dodged her doll-like hands and seemed to swim through the sky with an effortless flap of his wings. My little girl followed him, and I was in tow behind her. Timcanpy weaved us through the long maze of bookcases in a sluggish pace that almost sent me to sleep as I walked. Even little Malissa seemed to be losing interest in finding Allen. Regardless, we followed the golden ball until he came to a stop and rested on Malissa's head. His long tail arched and pointed to the girl's left, and she followed suit by pushing apart a couple books in the way of her view. She smiled widely when she saw who was on the other side of the books looking straight at her with a bright smile.

"Daddy, lookie! I found Mama!" She ran around the bookcase and wrapped her frail little arms around Allen's neck (he was kneeling down). I chuckled and looked down at the two.

"Hehe, you win, Malissa," Allen surrendered as he stroked her long hair. The little girl replied with a happy giggle and more nuzzling. He chuckled and looked up at me with gray orbs of curiosity. _Pfft, Malissa so takes after her mother... _"Something wrong, Lavi...? You're looking at me funny."

I blushed and realized I had been smiling the whole time. Breaking out into a small bout of laughter, I scratched the back of my head,"A-Ahaha! No, nothing's wrong, I just think it's cute how quickly you grew attached to Malissa. She... is a lot like you-" I smirked,"-in more ways than one." Not seeming to catch my drift, the white haired exorcist tilted his head ever so slightly and blinked, the curiosity in his eyes growing more and more. I blushed a little in response (not 'cause it was cute or anything it was...getting hot. Yeah. Running around the Order does that to you. It gets really hot).

"What do you mean she's a lot like me? She looks like me a little, I guess..." He stood up with Malissa in his arms and looked at her. She held Timcanpy in her tiny hands and gently ran her fingers along his wings. He didn't seem to object, for he nuzzled her palm and made himself comfortable,"Does she act like me?"

"W-Well... She has your curious nature. And she's pretty careful about what she does. And if you ask me, she looks more doll-like than human-like," I smiled at her, but Allen didn't seem to like that comment.

"Oh, so you think I look like a doll?" He pouted, and oddly enough, I just smiled more.

"Well, you are pretty small for your age... In height and body structure," I stared at his silver mirror-like eyes for a second after I said that. From there, my gaze traveled down his frail figure, taking in every detail from the way his posture tilted to support his and Malissa's weight to how his clothes tugged and rested on his body. He squirmed a little under my line of vision, making me blink back to reality,"S-Sorry."

"You okay? You're acting a little weird..."

"I'm fine!" I lied. To be honest, I have no idea what the hell is wrong with me today. Maybe it's just from all the stress of today's events,"Just a little tired... Speaking of which, where do you think the kids are gonna sleep? They won't all fit in our rooms, and I doubt they'd be very comfortable in the cafeteria," Allen pondered the question and stared at the ground in thought.

"Well, since they're already split up amongst everyone in the Order, do you think they should just bunk with who they're staying with? We're all technically family here, I don't think it'd be a problem..."

"That sounds good. The only problem I can see is Yuu not being very...cooperative with having roommates he can't bully like the rest of us," I laughed nervously, wondering how his group of Exponents are doing. Allen did the same.

"Wanna go check up on them? All I gotta do is get my group together and we'll go ahead and look for Kanda's."

"Sounds good," I walked alongside Allen to the lounge area of the second floor of the library. It was similar to the one downstairs, equipped with a long comfortable auburn couch, a recliner of the same color, and a dark cherry wood coffee table resting on a beautifully patterned rug. Beside the recliner was a side table with a reading lamp on it, and in that recliner was a sleeping Neah with a book in his lap. Two other Exponents, Tristen and Julian, were playing with Allen's deck of cards on the couch while Stacy was deeply engrossed in a book on the One Hundred Years War (which in fact, did not last a full one hundred years. Just sayin'...) on the floor in front of it. Three other kids were running through the shelves of books playing tag, and I could tell the librarian was thoroughly annoyed with their loud bantering. I was surprised I didn't hear them on the floor below.

"How long have you guys been in the library...?" I asked as I raised an eyebrow suspiciously. Stacy's head shot up at the sound of my voice.

"Daddy, you're done with work?" She turned her book down on the table to keep her place and caught me in a big bear hug,"Mama brought us up here around the same time you left to do work," I looked at Allen with an amused smirk spreading across my lips. He blushed ever so slightly and frowned, averting his eyes. I chuckled.

"Was it because Mama wanted to stay within the radius of my awesome glow?" I struck a pose a flashed a proud grin. Allen just sighed and shook his head at 'the idiotic rabbit standing before him.' He won't admit it, but he knows I'm pretty fly. No one can deny me that.

"Mama said he wanted to make sure you did your work like you were told to," Stacy said with a laugh,"He said a Bookman shouldn't be slacking off like you do most of the time." This time, it was Allen's turn to wear the amused smirk. I sulked and looked at Allen with shot pride and a betrayed heart.

"Allen! I do NOT slack off all the time!" I sniffled as I continued with my mock hurt,"How could you tell your kids such things! Their dad is very hardworking and dependable and you know it!"

"Says the guy who had Jesus wake him up at least twice in one hour," the boy smirked even wider at me as the fluster set itself deep into my skin. I gritted my teeth and turned away with a pout.

"Evil little beansprout..." I muttered. Allen rolled his eyes and put Malissa down on the couch and went to wake up Neah. _At least I win in my mind..._

" Hey, Daddy, what does a Bookman do?" Stacy asked me as she tugged at the edge of my shirt.

"A Bookman is a person meant to record the history of the world that you don't normally find in textbooks. We find the secret history that the world doesn't know. Plus we also specialize in translating certain books, texts, and scripts to other languages," I answered almost automatically. I stared off into space as I thought over the definition of myself and what I existed to do. _We're bystanders not meant to have any emotional ties with history and history-in-the-making... Man, did I ever screw that up._

"That sounds like a lot of fun!" Stacy gaped. I looked down at her with an equal amount of surprise in my expression.

"Huh?"

"I wanna be a Bookman! I think it'd be a lot of fun to go around and write down history! It's like being an undercover super hero or something!" She grinned and looked at me with green eyes of anticipation. I chuckled and ruffled her wild brown hair.

"I don't mind having little Bookmen apprentices. Hey, Allen, can Stacy be a Bookman?" He laughed at me, though I think I heard a little bit of fear in his voice. I felt a pain in my chest, as if I had done something wrong to make him fear that decision. It must have been minor though, because Allen immediately smiled his usual smile at me, instantly melting all troubles and doubts I had away. _Damn, how does he DO that?_

"I don't care, as long as that's what she wants. Besides, I'm sure you and Bookman wouldn't mind having extra help," I nodded. Gramps didn't seem to approve of having all these grandkids around earlier in the day, but maybe he'll learn to accept them if I raised them like I should.

"Yeah, Gramps shouldn't mind," I concluded my thoughts out loud,"Do you think all the even number Exponents should be Bookmen?"

"W-What? But that means Malissa..." He trailed off as he looked at his little girl curled up on the couch asleep with Timcanpy nuzzled up with her. He frowned in protest, and I couldn't help but laugh.

"D'aawww, you're so protective over Malissa, it's kinda cute, Sprout," I said through my laughter. He just blushed and pouted more.

"I just... I dunno, I don't think she's suited to be a Bookman. And she's really young, so..." He continued his broken train of thought until I felt Stacy glaring at me from the corner of my eye.

"Daddy, I'm not an even number! I'm number 15. Neah is 14!" She pouted. I blinked as I realized the mistake.

"Ack! Sorry! Well... I guess it all works out then. All odd number exponents will be Bookmen, and that means your little Malissa is safe from the world of recording history," I smirked as I saw Allen glare at me. As annoyed as he might have been with my teasing, I didn't miss that little hint of relief in his eyes. _Hehe, you're so easy to read sometimes, Allen._

"L-Let's just get going. The kids are getting tired and we gotta pick up Kanda's group before he mauls them to death," Stacy and Neah shuddered at Allen's choice of words and picked up their pace as they walked out of the library. I laughed and held the sleeping Malissa in my arms as we walked down the hall.

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><p>"No."<p>

"Why not, Yuu? It'd be a great bonding time for you and the kids!"

"God damn it, Stupid Rabbit, I said no! It was a big enough pain in my backside babysitting these things for you, I'm sure as hell _not _letting them sleep in the same room as me!" Allen sighed in dismay and pinched the bridge of his nose in annoyance. Kanda and I had been arguing for the past ten minutes over the matter of letting the kids bunk with him, and so far I was on the losing end of the bargain.

"Just for one night?" I pushed on. Kanda's eye twitched in annoyance.

"You have ten seconds to get out of my room before this sword is lodged up your-"

"ALRIGHTKIDSLET'SGO," Allen broke in immediately and ushered the kids out of the Japanese exorcist's room (and I could definitely tell they were pretty eager to leave). I frowned in defeat when I heard Malissa whimper against my shoulder.

"Aw, now look at what you did, Yuu! You made Malissa cry," I rubbed her back gently and tried to get her to stop crying in case it made things worse. Kanda just sighed, agitated beyond his limits. He stood up and ushered me out of the room as well before slamming the door. Malissa just wailed even harder, her pale skin turning a light pink from her intense cries. My heart broke listening to such sobs and I immediately handed her to Allen.

"Mama, help me make her stop crying!" I sniffled, almost on the verge of tears myself. Allen sighed and rubbed gentle circles on his daughter's back as he hummed a soft melody to the beat of his footsteps. The song sounded familiar somehow, and it didn't hit me until Malissa stopped her crying and fell asleep what song he was humming.

"Hey, isn't that the song from the Ark?" I guessed. Allen nodded.

"It's the only song that came to mind... At least it worked, right?" I nodded in agreement and smiled softly.

"Hehe, you really do have a mother's magic..." I teased gently as I watched as Malissa sucked on her pacifier in irregular intervals in her sleep. Allen chuckled lightly.

"I guess I do..."

The rest of the walk continued in comfortable silence until I saw Jesus running with the rest of my group of children close behind them. They all looked...terrified.

"What's wrong, Jesus?" I asked when he reached us. He was panting heavily and took a minute to catch his breath before answering.

"K-Komui...is... c-crazy!" He said between pants. Stacy tilted her head.

"How?" she asked.

"Yeah, I thought I left you with Lenalee..." I said with mild suspicion.

"Y-You did, but while we were playing with Auntie Lenalee, Komui came and said some really...weird stuff," Allen and I both stared at Jesus with jaws dropped to the ground and color drained from our faces,"D-Does Komui normally compliment Auntie Lenalee and her motherly-ness?" Allen was the first to regain his composure enough to let out a nervous laugh.

"He...certainly thinks highly of his sister, we'll say that much..." He managed to say. Jesus shuddered.

"He's got a really scary sister complex..." The first born said, and I couldn't help but laugh at that,"I managed to, er... liberate Komui's group of kids, and I led my group with them to look for you, Dad. Did you find out where we're sleeping?"

"Yeah. We've decided to let you guys stay with who you were hanging out with today and you just room with them. But seeing how shaken up you guys look, I guess you guys aren't rooming with Komui..." They desperately shook their heads in protest to the idea, and I could sympathize.

"Well, now the problem is finding out where these guys are gonna sleep... There's too many of them to fit in one room, and even if we split the group up between our rooms, I doubt we could fit in there..." Allen sighed at our never ending problems. I tried coming up with a compromise, but nothing would come to mind. It wasn't until Neah shyly raised his hand to speak that I noticed the kids had something to say.

"C-Can... Uhm..." he buried his face into his scarf as he mumbled. Stacy frowned and nudged him, making him speak up," W-We can sleep in the library... There are two lounge areas there..." He trailed off.

"No, if anything, we want you guys to have beds and rooms to sleep in, not a big open room like the library..." I shook my head at the suggestion. Neah frowned and buried his face in the orange cloth around his neck again as his idea was rejected,"Well... We could switch roles and you guys split up between our rooms and me and Allen can sleep in the library." Allen looked at me in shock, but I ignored it (for the most part). The kids seemed to agree to such circumstances and nodded in unison. I chuckled a little, knowing very well they'd agree to just about anything out of exhaustion. It was getting pretty late and the Order was already dead silent,"Alrighty, let's get you guys to bed..."

Once the rooming situation was finally settled (after a brief argument with Gramps and a drop kick to my head for leaving him with all the kids, that is), Allen and I quietly walked ourselves to the library's upper lounge, which was closest to our rooms.

"You know, you didn't have to bring both of us into this situation. I could have stayed with the kids in case they needed something or if they were afraid," He sighed and ran a hand through his hair,"I'm worried, my group is left alone in my room while yours has Bookman to watch over them..." I chuckled.

"Relax, Sprout, they have Jesus and Timcanpy there. Jesus is quite a leader, I'm sure if things go wrong, he'll be there for them. And if they need the bathroom, Tim's got their back," I reassured.

"My name is Allen," was all he said in response, making me smile more.

"Sure thing, Mama Alle- Oof!" I rubbed my side, as it was roughly abused by the exorcist's elbow. He just smiled and held the door open to the library. I walked in and squinted. It was pitch black in there,"I guess there aren't any librarians on the night shift tonight."

"Weird, I thought Johnny was supposed to be here," Allen said with a frown in his voice (I think. I can't tell in this damn darkness). Before I could say anything in response, I ran into a bookshelf and knocked my knee into the frame of it.

"Ow! God freaking-" I backed up and bumped into Allen, who let out a small 'Umph!' at the sudden contact,"S-Sorry, Sprout. I don't do so well in dark places like these..."

"I noticed..." He said as he rubbed his nose. He sighed and snaked his hand into mine, making me shiver uncomfortably. Man, I really hate being unaware of my surroundings. Stupid eye patch. Stupid darkness. Stupid Allen and him having to lead me through the library like I'm a child...

"Ack!" Stumbling over my own feet, I bumped into Allen again and made us both topple into what felt like the recliner. I felt my hand knock against the side table, so I ran my fingers along the lamp and flipped its switch. I blinked back the light until my eye adjusted, and as soon as it did it met eyes of a stunning cold silver. The orange-y yellow from the lamp tinted the silvery eyes in a way that gave life their cold color, but still kept that magical glow to them. A small shiver ran up my spine from how intense those eyes were... They were like mirrors. I could almost see myself in them, but instead I saw a chilling void stare at me as if it was filling in everything I was missing; everything that I lacked. _These eyes..._

"L-Lavi!" He squeaked, his eyes shutting tightly. I blinked as the connection was cut off from those magical silver orbs. I sighed, not noticing I was holding my breath, and looked down beneath my body to see a beet red Allen Walker curled up under me with his face only inches from mine. I felt the heat rise to my cheeks and I scrambled to get myself off of him. We had fallen sideways on the recliner, with our legs dangling over one of the arms of the chair while Allen's head rested upon the opposite one. I propped myself up and used my arms to support my weight as I looked at Allen, who finally opened his eyes to look back up at me.

"S-Sorry, Sprout. Did I crush you?"

"K-Kinda..." he muttered and blushed more as he averted his gaze,"With..."

"Huh? I couldn't hear that last part."

"W-With your..." He trailed off again, the blush growing in intensity. I stared at Allen curiously, trying to figure out what he was trying to say. As if succumbing to the fact that he couldn't verbally explain what happened, he bit his lip and looked at me with those polished silver mirrors again...

It took a good minute, but damn I sure did catch his drift. The heat rising in my cheeks grew and I pushed myself off of the recliner away from Allen, feeling like I violated his very being.

"I-I'm so sorry! I-I..I didn't mean to! I couldn't see and - " My ranting went on for a good while before Allen got up and put his hand to my mouth to silence me.

"It's...f-fine," he sighed the last word with evident exhaustion. I blinked and frowned under his hand. He lowered it, and I stood there feeling awkward, guilty, and quite dirty.

"Y-You sure?"

"It was an accident, right?"

"Of course it was!"

"Then yes, it's fine," We stood there staring at the ground in awkward silence before I made the first move and claimed the couch as my bed for the night.

"You gonna be okay sleeping on the recliner?" I asked before I made myself comfortable. Allen shrugged a little.

"I mean, it wasn't my first choice..."

"I-I can take the recliner if you want the couch."

"No, if you want it, you take it."

"But you don't want the recliner."

"I said I'll be fine."

"No you didn't, you said it wasn't your first choice."

"Lavi, go to sleep!" I huffed and stood up and grabbed the beansprout's hand and pulled him onto the couch, sitting him next to me.

"If you want the couch, then take the couch! I'll sleep in the recliner. I'll be fine!" Allen glared at me, and I glared back. We stayed like that for a long while, continuing our argument in silence as we fought with our eyes. Sighing with obvious annoyance, Allen turned his body away and crossed his arms.

"You're a stubborn rabbit..." he muttered. I rolled my eye and crossed my arms too.

"And you're a stubborn beansprout."

"It's _Allen._"

"Fine, you're a stubborn Allen," Another sigh. _Victory for Lavi Bookman Jr._

Again, we stayed like that for a good minute or two before I felt something rest itself on my right shoulder (curse my blind side). I jumped a little in surprise, as I was half asleep, but after I turned to see what it was, my vision was obscured by soft white hair that smelled vaguely of vanilla. I smiled softly realizing Allen had fallen asleep against me, then chuckled a little to myself at his feminine scent. I wasn't complaining though, I rather enjoyed it...

After a careful minute of shifting myself, I finally found a decent position that was comfortable to sleep in and one that wasn't so awkward. At least, it wasn't awkward until Allen fell further against me and nuzzled his head against the crook of my neck. I blushed a little, but didn't protest as I was too exhausted to complain. With a sigh of defeat, I subconsciously wrapped my arms gently around Allen's slender waist and fell asleep. This lifestyle is definitely gonna take some getting used to, but there's something weird about it all that's been throwing me off.

_I don't think I'm complaining..._

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><p><strong>Hehehe, I decided to finally throw in a little bit of Laven fluff to get the story rolling finally. Not a whole lot in this chapter again, but it's starting to introduce some important parts for the story, such as Bookman and Lavi's infatuation with Allen's mirror-like eyes... C:<strong>

**Please please PLEASE~ review! I'd really like to hear what you think about this so far, and I'd love any helpful criticism to help make it better. Anyone that reviews will get a shout-out, just like I did this chapter in the A/N up top! Lots of love to you guys. Hope you enjoyed this longer chapter~ *hearts***


	4. Porcelain Angel

**Thanks for all the positive feedback, everyone! (: It really makes my day when I read your reviews, and I'm really glad you guys are enjoying it so far. There are a few important things I'd like to ask though, but I'll get to that in the Author's Note at the bottom so you don't have to wait even longer to read. xD**

**Shout-outs to: Chibi Moko-Chan, Elric Lawliet, DR. EPIC, Sotong sotong (absolutely loved your review, thank you SO much *heart*), TinariBlade, and the-not-so-innocent-uke. Thanks for the reviews guys!**

**WARNING: This story contains yaoi (Laven). It's not too bad. It's more of a Bromance if anything at all.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own D. Gray-Man. *sadface***

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><p><strong>Chapter Four: Porcelain Angel<strong>

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><p>I'm usually not a person to hate things very much, but <em>man<em> if I had to choose one thing in the world to hate, I'd have to choose weird dreams. I'm not talking about things like wanting to become a superhero or wanting to be the owner of the most tin cans in the world, but I'm talking about _literal _dreams; the ones you have when you sleep.

Being a person with a higher level of thinking gives me a lot to dream about when I sleep (if I ever get any, that is). That's not always a bad thing, because I can dream up some pretty badass stuff, but the only downfall to my highly advanced mind is just that. It's highly advanced - so advanced that even I have a hard time trying to figure out what the hell I'm dreaming about...

And that brings me to my problem.

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><p><em>Last night was probably the most cryptic dream I've had in a long time. It started out with pitch blackness. Nothing unusual there. I could feel myself slowing falling into my subconscious, and pretty soon I could see myself in my own dream. I can see myself walking down an invisible road in this darkness, but of course I can't see where I'm going. I walked for what seemed like hours until I finally felt a change in the path I was walking on. My balance was thrown out of whack, and I was suddenly walking upside down on the same road. As I walked, I looked up - to the ground, I guess - to see another version of me walking in the opposite direction, toward me. He looked exactly like me, only he was faded out like a ghost would be and he had a content smile on his face. He looked free and not held down by any sort of chains, and when he walked he had a more casual stride. We ended up passing each other, and almost as if he planned it, I started feeling colder and lifeless the farther he walked from me.<em>

_I wanted to turn back. I wanted to see him again. The warmth in his smile, the happiness in his footsteps, the laughter in his ghostly green eye; I wanted it. I craved it._

_I _needed_ it._

_But I didn't look back. I didn't turn around and run after him. I couldn't. I couldn't bring myself to do it, because on the inside it wasn't what was meant for me. I didn't need the happiness, the warmth, the contentment in living, or even the feeling of _feeling_. I just kept on walking._

_And walking. And walking. _And walking...

_By the time I was numb from the cold and from walking so far, I heard children laughing in the distance. I looked up again and I could see my children, one by one, running past me in the same direction as my happier self. I wanted to look back and watch them run, to see their childish innocence engulf them as they smiled and laughed and played with each other. I wanted so desperately to run after them to the happier, gentler side of the road I was on._

_But I couldn't bring myself to follow. I kept walking and counted each child as they passed me. I counted every smile, laugh, footstep, and heartbeat. I called out to each and every child by their name, but I wasn't heard._

_Three hundred and twenty-four times, my heart was shattered. Did Bookmen have hearts? Of course we did, but were we allowed to use them? Not at all. We couldn't have emotional ties with history. I was taught that and to the bitter end, I followed my teachings. There were many friends I abandoned because of my dedication to my clan, but I never knew if that abandonment was the right thing to do. I didn't question myself though, I just kept walking. This time, however, it felt different..._

_Finally, I stopped walking. I looked up from the black void I had traversed across and standing in front of me was a white angel... No, it wasn't an angel. It looked broken, worn down, and guilty of sin. Against skin of white porcelain were scars of war, and the scars continued up and around the shoulder of the angel's left arm until the arm itself was engulfed in cold black skin. _Softly riddled along his lips was a smile so pure I could hear the laughter ringing through my ears in a sweet melody. Along his cheek lay a mangled red scar. Prominently defined was the bloody embodiment of sin against the pure snow white of this little angel. _Pity overcame me as I looked at him. Despite all of his pain and his suffering, his innocent glow remained unchanged, but it was obvious that all of the trauma in his life made him vulnerable. His eyes showed this weakness._

_Those mirrors again. They were glassy, but life shined brightly in those silvery orbs. They were cold, lonely, and fragile, but warm and caring. The dull void gave such a sinister touch to the boy's pristine face. It was a little chilling, yet relaxing. This angel was contradictory of many, many things, but those eyes were the definition of his very being. Those mirror-like orbs of contradiction shielded his own soul from being seen and instead gave meaning to the one that dared tried to read him. They took whatever the angel had and filled themselves with everything they lacked and craved, unaware of the angel's true burdens._

_I felt guilty somehow when I looked at him. He gave me the happiness I wanted, but the person behind the mirror was unreadable and beyond reach. It was evident he needed help, but despite himself he gave more than he could gain back. Desperately, I stepped forward and tried to aid the fallen angel, tracing my hand over his bold scar. He flinched at my touch and a mix of emotions set into the mirrors, cracking their facade and brought reality to my eyes._

I didn't know how to help him, because I didn't know how to help myself, _I concluded. That didn't stop me though, because deep down somewhere in my very being, I knew he wanted the help. He needed it and I wanted to be the one to be there for him. It wasn't because I felt bad for him, because in truth I didn't._

_It was because I needed him just as badly._

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><p>I stared at the ceiling as that damn dream ran through my head for the thousandth time that early morning. I could feel a soft heat rise to my cheeks every time I replayed the end of the dream. It sickened me a little bit, but at the same time it felt right...<p>

I looked at the clock hanging on the wall just above the couch I was laying on. Five thirty in the morning. Sighing solemnly, my eyes fell back down to the angel that haunted my dreams lying against me in a silent slumber. Everything was quiet except for the sound of the ticking clock and the soft breathing of said angel. I couldn't help but smile a little bit as I watched him sleep. _He really does look like an angel in a way..._

God damn it, I'm doing it again... Why do I feel this way? It's not right, but it feels like it is... It's not a feeling of love, it's a feeling of protection, right? There _is _a difference, right? I... I don't know anymore. I groaned in irritation, not noticing how loud I was compared to the enchanting silence of the library. The irritable sound echoed softly throughout the large chamber and I felt Allen shift a little in response. I tensed up when I felt him move. It feels weird to have someone sleep on top of you, especially if that person was in your most recent dream... Another blush crept into my cheeks as Allen sat up and rubbed his eyes. My arms reluctantly loosened their soft grip on the boy's waist as I allowed him more freedom to sit up. He yawned and looked at me with exhaustion still remaining in those damned silver eyes of his... The blush darkened.

"M-Morning, Allen," I mustered with a usual smile. No use in trying to fight off the blush now.

"Morning, Lavi," He slurred with a raspy morning voice,"You okay? You look a little feverish..."

"I'm fine. Did you sleep okay?"

"Yeah, for the most part... S-Sorry I fell on top of you. I was too exhausted from arguing to really stop myself from falling asleep..." He laughed lightly, making me feel a lot lighter in spirit too.

"It's fine. I won the argument, so I'm not complaining."

"What? What do you mean you won?"

"You slept on the couch instead of the recliner, so I win."

"Technically, I slept on you. Therefore, you didn't really win," He retorted with an amused grin.

"Ah, but I didn't technically lose either, so that's still a win in my eyes," I chuckled and returned the grin.

"I think you mean 'eye,' right Lavi?"

"Oi, that was a low blow, man," I glared with mock irritation. Allen just laughed at me,"Hehe, I guess you couldn't help it. It's not like you can reach high enough anyway, Beansprout."

"My name is Allen, you stupid-" A low, menacing growl echoed through the room and I immediately sat up in fear.

"What the hell was that?"

"My stomach, you dunce. I'm hungry," Allen pouted with an embarrassed blush. I busted out laughing, which made him pout even more.

"Alright, we'll go get some breakfast now I guess. The kids shouldn't be awake yet, and if they are, they know how to get to the cafeteria," I slowly got up and stretched to wake up my muscles, then walked out of the library with Allen in silence. It wasn't a very comfortable silence for me, though. The dream I had last night would _not _leave my mind for the life of me... The white haired shorty walking next to me seemed to notice my discomfort.

"You alright, Lavi?" the question came with just the right amount of concern.

"I'm fine, just a bit tired still. I woke up quite a while before you did, so I didn't get much sleep."

"I'm sorry to hear that... It wasn't because of me, was it?"

"Haha, of course not, Sprout. It's just my Bookman's schedule keeping me on my toes. Who needs sleep when history needs to be written, right?" Allen laughed.

"Maybe if you didn't fall asleep during your work, you'd be able to sleep better at night," He teased with a mischievous grin. I pouted this time.

"Maybe if you eat your vegetables you'll grow a couple of inches," I shot back. He elbowed me in the side with quite a bit of force, but I knew he didn't mean any harm. I smiled at his offended expression, and in a few short moments, he smiled in return. It felt good to joke around like this with Allen. It helped ease that awkward feeling I had earlier, and it reminded me that no matter what could possibly happen, I'd always have a friend in him. I just hoped he felt the same way with me.

We reached the cafeteria in no time thanks to our brotherly bickering. Jerry was already hard at work cooking breakfast for the people that were already awake, so Allen and I decided to go ahead and take a seat while we waited to be served.

"I'm _telling you_, Lavi," Allen sighed,"There _are_ books out there that have no meaning or purpose whatsoever and they are merely meant to be read for fun."

"Lies! I refuse to accept that! Books are all made for a special purpose, there's not _one_ book out there that wasn't made for one reason or another."

"Some books are made for the sake of being made, Lavi! Like I said, some don't have a purpose!"

"Name ONE book that was made with no purpose. C'mon, little grasshopper in Bookmanism, show me what you know!" As Allen was about to open his mouth to answer, my attention was directed to Komui walking up to us with a man standing at his side. Even if he had his professional appearance now, his face certainly didn't show the coming of good news...

"Allen, there's someone important I must introduce to you," The Supervisor said in a serious tone. Allen blinked obliviously, then turned his attention to the man standing next to him. I examined him too, curious as to who this stranger was. He had long blond hair pulled back in a neat well-kept braid and had two dots going down the center of his forehead. I couldn't help but chuckle a little to myself. Those dots were _really _distracting and _really _amusing. His expression was a bit more unreadable compared to Komui's, but he didn't seem to be as worried.

"My name is Howard Link. I'll be supervising you from now on. You're to be put on 24-hour surveillance and will have limited contact with your fellow comrades," He introduced himself in a professional manner, but the way he talked really irritated me and confused me. 24-hour surveillance? Limited contact? What the hell was this guy talking about? As if things couldn't get any weirder, he pulled out a box with a large (and I'll admit, rather delicious smelling) pie in it,"I've baked a pumpkin pie as an offering to a mutual partnership. It's very nice to meet you." I looked at my white haired comrade and felt my heart drop a little. It was as if all things serious flew in one ear and out the other as soon as he saw that pumpkin pie.

"Oh, thanks! I'm Allen Walker, it's nice to meet you," He said briefly before grabbing a fork and reaching to grab a bite of the pie,"Bon apetit~"

"A-Allen, not so fast! He just said he'd be supervising you!" I grabbed his hand to stop him from his impulsive actions and glared at this Howard Link guy. Who the hell does he think he is to take Allen away from us all of a sudden? This guy pisses me off... "How do you expect him to have limited contact when he's got three hundred twenty-four kids to look after, hm?" This gave him quite a shock, and the expression on his snobby face was absolutely _priceless._

"K-Kids?" He eyed Allen suspiciously, who in return blushed lightly in embarrassment,"D-Dare I ask how...? A-And so many..!"

"Komui, I thought you told him!" Allen said, trying to direct the attention away from him. Komui just turned his head away from us and pushed his glasses further up the bridge of his nose.

"I... may have mentioned it," he said finally, but not a damn bit convincing. I sighed in irritation.

"Either way, there's no way you can take Allen from us that easily, especially when he has responsibilities to tend to already, Two-Spot." Jerry came in at that precise moment to bring us our breakfast.

"Now now, no fighting so early in the morning! That'll upset your stomachs. Go ahead and dig in while I prepare breakfast for the kiddies!" With one last glare at Link (who eagerly returned one just as menacing), I turned in my seat and ate my food silently. It didn't really satisfy though, as my mind was wrapped around too many things to enjoy the food. Allen didn't seem to show any signs of worry since he ate like the little pig he was, but deep down I knew he was worried... Something even told me to go as far as to say he was scared. I shrugged it off and pushed it toward the back of my mind though and tried my best not to worry. My gut told me that the real worry would be coming later on today...

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><p>As the morning slowly transitioned into early afternoon, the Exponents came filing into the cafeteria in groups of tens and twenties. Some of the chaperons still looked quite tired from their shift of babysitting while others looked like they couldn't wait to spend another day with my darling kids. Every now and then I'd sneak a glance at Two-Spot, smiling more and more to myself as his face expressed his disbelief in what I told him. Allen sunk in his seat between me and Two-Spot as the morning progressed. I could tell he was quite embarrassed and in fear of having his first impression distorted into something more scandalous than what really happened, but to be honest, this was way too much fun to let it go.<p>

"Hey Dad, guess what?" Micah called as he came to sit next to me.

I swallowed my forkful of food before ruffling his hair and smiling at him,"What's up, kiddo?" He didn't seem too amused by the gesture since he slapped my hand away from his white locks.

"I heard from Kathryn and Hayden that we were gonna get official outfits like you guys in the Order." He paused to try out the pancakes, seemed to purr contently at the taste,"Lots of us have decided on what we wanna do around the Order, and Stacy spread the news of most of the odd number Exponents being Bookmen." Micah continued to inform me on the different things each little division of his siblings had to share. I found it quite amusing how they set up such a stable communication chain through Jesus, Stacy, Pablo, Micah, and even Malissa. Neah must have also been a part of the chain since he stayed close to Stacy and Malissa. Even if they haven't known each other very long, they already had an organized way of talking to each other, and for the most part, they all got along with each oth-

"Jesus, you little liar!" An angry little girl shrieked from somewhere on the other end of the cafeteria. All the kids and a few of the adults turned their heads simultaneously to see who it was that screamed. It turned out to be Stacy.

"How am I a liar? I'm being honest when I say I didn't steal it, Stacy," The first born said with a hint of darkness in his voice. I couldn't see them clearly, but their argument was quite audible from where I was sitting.

"Wipe that smartass smirk off your face you little jerk!" Allen choked on his food when he heard Stacy yell such a thing, and honestly I couldn't blame him. Where'd she learn to talk like that? Certainly not from me. The white haired exorcist seemed to be able to read my mind, for my eye was met with silver eyes that just _screamed _"Don't even go there."

In the distance, there was a clatter of dishes and loud banging on the tabletops, and immediately I knew Stacy and Jesus got in a fight. Panicking, I trudged through the sea of people to reach the source of all the chaos.

"Hey, hey, hey! Break it up you two!" I pulled Stacy by the back of her shirt and held Jesus back with my free hand. They were both battered up and panting heavily from their quarrel,"What's the problem here?"

Stacy was quick to answer,"That little jerk face stole my notebook I kept for keeping notes as an apprentice Bookman!" She pouted and glared daggers at Jesus, who didn't seem fazed at all.

"I didn't steal your damned notebook, Stay. Stop blaming all your problems on me," he yawned. I thumped him on the head.

"Hey, no bad mouthing! You shouldn't be talking like that anyway, you're too young for that kind of talk." I scolded. It felt weird to scold the kid though... I've never really had to parent children before.

"Yeah, so shut up and give my notebook back before I really get angry, jerk!" The brunette sure did have a fiery temper...

"Look, I'm telling you I'm not lying! Do I look like a liar?" He looked me and Stacy dead in the eyes. I tried looking for some sort of sign to point out a lie, but...

"Stacy, maybe you just misplaced it," I said finally. The little girl looked up at me with such disgust it made my heart break.

"I didn't lose it! He stole it, I swear he did!"

"Jesus, fess up now and your punishment won't be nearly as bad as it could be if you refuse," Allen chimed in. I looked over my shoulder and saw him staring down our first born son with a menacing leer. Jesus seemed to choke up a little and backed down. He cursed under his breath (bad Jesus! No!) and dug into his pants pocket, then threw a small green notebook at Stacy.

"Now leave me alone, annoying brat of a sister," he avoided eye contact with Allen, reluctantly resigning himself to defeat. Allen just smiled and ruffled his hair.

"How'd you know I was lying?"

This time I saw a small twinkle of mischievousness flash in Allen's silver irises. "You're my kid. I can tell when you're cheating and when you're not." Jesus seemed satisfied with that answer and succumbed to a silent defeat. Just then, Link made his presence known by clearing his throat and stepping forward.

"Excuse me, Mr. Walker, but you and I have some matters to discuss in private. There's a bit of paperwork you'll need to read over and complete by tomorrow morning, and I believe it would be best for you to get an early start on it." Allen frowned and sighed.

"Alright... I'll see you guys later, okay? I'll try to find time to hang out with all of you." He smiled at the kids crowding around him for last minute hugs before he left for the day. They protested in cries and whines, but they knew they wouldn't win. I watched as the little beansprout made his way through the vast field of children and comrades to the exit of the cafeteria, and I didn't take my eye off of him until Two-Spot shut the door behind them both. I sighed in defeat as I sat down beside Stacy and stared at the ceiling. I was left alone with the kids and I had no idea what the heck I was supposed to do with them all... I spotted Komui not very far from me and I waved him over.

"Hey, Komui, I've been meaning to ask you this for a while now..." I started once he sat down. He nodded and sipped his coffee patiently before I continued,"What was the point in this whole experiment in the first place?"

Silence. I waited it out...

More silence. I raised an eyebrow.

A slow sip of his coffee. My lips pursed into a firm line of unamused annoyance.

"Well?" I inquired.

He sighed,"You see... I wanted to know what it would be like to combine the traits of two well-trained fighters such as you and Allen to create a person who inherited the dominant traits of both. Jesus here is probably the best example of what I was going for, and in my eyes he turned out to be a success."

I stared at him like he was crazy (which we all knew he was). Lenalee, who was a couple seats away from me, frowned,"Brother, that doesn't make any sense..."

"Alright well..." He paused again for his coffee, then started slowly,"Using a bit of biochemistry, I took the DNA from both Allen and Lavi to mix and create a separate being that inherited different traits from both of the 'parents.' In a way, you could say it was a more scientific process of making a child. However, because of the process I went with to create these Exponents, they were "born" with unnatural abilities a normal child wouldn't have. This is why they were created at an age where they could fully understand human speech patterns and move on their own. Due to my Komurin not being strong enough to generate a child around the same age as Allen, the maximum age for the Exponents is about eight years old."

"I understand that much, but... What do you mean by unnatural abilities?" I looked at the kids sitting around me eating their breakfasts and minding their own business.

"I'll demonstrate for you," Komui stood up and led Jesus and me around the table to where Reever was. The Supervisor took the knife from the scientist's hands (where he protested with quite foul language and reluctance) and gave it to me. He then made Jesus step back a few meters so there was a bit of a distance between us. Once he had us in the positions his wanted us in, he stepped back,"Now Lavi, throw the knife at Jesus as if you were to attack him."

"Are you fucking crazy?" I blurted out. I apologized to the Exponents around me, then looked at Komui in shock,"Why would I attack my own ki-"

"Just do it. You'll see what I mean."

I gulped and looked at Jesus, who stood there casually with his hands in his pockets and his bi-colored eyes staring up at me in anticipation. He chuckled a little, probably from watching how shaken I was.

"I found out the hard way that Uncle Komui was crazy, Dad, remember?" He took a hand out of his pocket and gestured with a smirk,"Throw it."

After a quick pray to the heavens that I wouldn't hurt my son, I tossed the knife expertly at him, aiming square between his eyes. The knife flew threw the air with a soft whistle. Dead silence swallowed the cafeteria whole as they watched this terrifying display, but it had ended as soon as it began.

I had blinked and missed the whole thing. The last thing I saw was Jesus' posture slightly altered and his hand twisted so his palm faced the wall nearest to us. He had a small triumphant smile on his face and he looked at the wall. I followed his gaze and felt a cold shiver run down my spine and my breath hitched in a small gasp.

He deflected the knife and it was now wedged in between the bricks of the wall. The kids all looked at Jesus with amazement and admiration.

"See what I mean? By combining your traits together using Komurin, I created a young warrior with high amounts of potential," he said as he tried to pull the knife out of the wall. It was stuck in there pretty good, but eventually he got it out,"Unfortunately, because of the high amounts of power it took to create Jesus and Pablo, the children following them are substantially weaker, and because there's such a high number of kids..."

"That means Malissa is pretty much powerless," I concluded as I looked at the little doll who claimed Kanda's lap as her seat. I smiled on the inside when I saw this, and I tried my best not to laugh when I noticed that Kanda didn't seem to mind her at all.

"Yes, precisely. However, there is another theory I wanted to test out," The Supervisor placed the knife down on the table and walked over to me,"You and Allen are both exorcists. You are an equipment type while Allen is a parasitic type. I wanted to test and see if possible traces of Allen's parasitic Innocence would be passed down to these children. I figured since they're closer in age than an adult would be to their newborn, that there would be a connection to something I call the "Child's Innocence."" I looked at him in bewilderment.

"You lost me there..." I admitted.

"As a child, you are protected by a special kind of Innocence created by naivety. It's a bit different from the Innocence we use to hunt Akuma. This kind of Innocence exists in all children to protect them from such dangers in the world such as despair, poverty, greed, and violence. It's a bit weak, however, and it is very dependent on outside forces guiding it to make it stronger," He paused for a moment and looked at me to see if I was digesting all of this. I obviously wasn't, and he knew then that he had to continue,"Let's take Allen for example. He was born with his anti-akuma weapon and was completely oblivious to what it was. He was naive, and his Child's Innocence tried to protect him from seeing the future he was destined to have. When his foster parent died, his Child's Innocence weakened, and he fell into a greater sin of turning him into an Akuma. By the time Cross had picked him up, his Child's Innocence had died and his anti-akuma weapon was born," He looked at me again as he was pacing the cafeteria slowly as he explained this concept to everyone, who was listening intently. I nodded once I pieced together his concept and agreed that it all made sense so far.

"So, for example, Krory must be the same way, right?" I asked as I tried to make a connection myself,"He was isolated in that castle all his life and was shielded from the dangers of the outside world. When he found out Eliade's true form, his Childish Innocence evolved too, right?"

Komui nodded,"Depending on the circumstances, the Child's Innocence can live for quite a long time before it evolves. Now, let's use Malissa as another example. At present, her Child's Innocence is strong, and it will remain strong as long as she's protected. If she is shielded from harmful outside forces that could weaken her Child's Innocence until she is mature enough to let it go without some sort of psychological scar, she may give birth to a very powerful anti-akuma weapon, and a parasitic one at that. However, if she were exposed to something dangerous too early in her life, her Child's Innocence would be too weak to sustain a parasitic type evolution."

"So that experiment was to test if you could create a parasitic type accommodator through the use of Child's Innocence?" Lenalee said slowly as she pieced together what she had learned.

"Precisely! Ah, you're absolutely brilliant, my dearly beloved Lenalee~" Komui sang as he reached to hug his sister. She dodged the hug effortlessly and sighed.

"Such a complicated experiment, and risky too..."

"Haha, you're telling me? I feel like I'm under pressure now!" I hugged Stacy and nuzzled her,"I have to protect you all with my life! I promise never to let harm reach any of you! Daddy's honorable promise!"

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><p>Man, did I ever fuck up that promise...<p>

"Pablo! Hang in there, Pablo, help is coming!" I sat there in the training grounds cradling my second born son, who was screaming in agonizing pain. I cursed myself over and over and over again for my foolish mistake.

It was all my fault...

I was stupid enough to promise not to let harm reach any of my children. I was stupid enough to take my children out for a little bit of training to test their skills, and I was stupid enough to misjudge the distance between the hammer's spike and Pablo, who was mindlessly running in the way unaware that he ran in the range of my swing...

_I'm an idiot... A huge idiot._

I ran beside the nurse as she carried Pablo to the infirmary for proper care.

_I was stupid enough to think that I was strong enough to handle caring for these kids like I could be their father._

Desperately trying to keep Pablo conscious despite the loss of blood, I held his little hand in mine,"I'm here, Pablo, you'll be okay... I'll be there to help you, it's gonna be alright."

_What was I thinking? I don't know how to help him._

_I don't even know how to help myself._

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><p><strong>I feel a little bad leaving you guys with this terribly rushed ending, but I hope this chapter is okay in the long run. This one makes me a bit nervous, because I was having a hard time trying to add more detail to Lavi's feelings toward Allen and keep the story moving at the same time. It was also really hard explaining the origin of Komui's experiment, and I just KNOW I lost many of you guys to that really bad explanation...A lot of this chapter feels rushed to me... I'm really sorry. :C I'll take any constructive criticism though.<strong>

**I do want to say a sincere thank you to those of you that reviewed last chapter! As I read the reviews, I couldn't help but smile. It makes me happy seeing your happy reviews and knowing my writing at least makes you laugh here and there. xD Please, I can not stress this enough - Review, review, review! The more reviews I get, the more in the mood it makes me to write and the more effort I put into making it enjoyable for you guys! Lemme know what you think! What are you favorite parts? Least favorite parts? I wanna know!**

****Also, I want to know if you guys think it would be okay to let something happen between Allen and Lavi? Originally, this was supposed to just strengthen their friendship and nothing more, but as I write this, there are many directions this fic could go in... Your opinions?**  
><strong>

**Lots of love! See you next chapter~ *hearts***


	5. Call Out to Me

**Hey guys~ I don't really have much to say up here, so right after the shout-outs, you can read. :)**

**Shout-Outs: sweetkakes35, Chibi Moko-chan, ElricLawliet, DR. EPIC, TinariBlade, and Brokenheartedexorcist (I love your fanfic Fallen Angel, by the way. It's really sweet, and I look forward to an update!)**

**WARNING: This story contains yaoi (Laven). It's not too bad. It's may be more of a Bromance, but that is subject to change as the story progresses.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own D. Gray-Man. *sadface***

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><p><strong><span>Chapter Five: Call Out to Me<span>**

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><p>"He's not dead, first of all," The nurse said as she took a quick look at my distraught face. I felt all the air I held in my lungs release in a huge sigh of relief,"The hammer did quite a number on his left eye though, so he'll have to stay here and recover for a week or so..." I nodded in understanding as I digested what she said.<p>

"Thank you, Nurse..." I said with a small bow. She just nodded and smiled a little hesitantly.

"At least now he looks more like his father, yes?" I blinked and looked at her, then laughed a little bit (although in the back of my head I thought that was quite a sick joke to be making). Jesus and Stacy walked up to me as I turned away from the infirmary to leave Pablo to rest. My heart ached painfully when I saw their faces...

They were angry and disappointed with me.

"Why would you do that, Dad?" Jesus asked me with tears building up in his eyes. I could tell he wasn't crying out of sadness, but out of anger and guilt,"You... You didn't have to use your Innocence right off the bat like that. You could have killed Pablo...!" He yelled, his voice cracking as the tears were threatening to fall. He clenched his teeth and refused to let the tears fall no matter how far on the verge they were. Stacy just stood there glaring daggers of shame at me; her once bright and fiery eyes now turned into ice cold steel. I bit my lip and let my head slowly fall as I directed my eyes at the ground in front of me.

"I'm...I'm sorry..." was all I could muster. I felt horrible. I was being yelled at by my eight year old son, and what made everything hurt more was that he was right... Not only was my pride shot, but now the guilt is going to eat me alive,"I wasn't thinking, and I'm really sorry..."

"You should be! What would you have done if Pablo was killed, huh?" Jesus was furious, and all I could do was stand there and let him be angry at me. _How am I supposed to respond...? _"Do you think all of your kids are just a bunch of rag dolls you can throw around? That, just because you have over three hundred of us, losing a couple here and there is nothing?"

Hearing this, I scrambled to clear everything up,"I-I don't think that, Jesus! I-"

"Do you really think that because we were born differently that we can be treated differently?"

_No, I don't. Please, don't think that..._

"Pablo may have been the second born but you heard Uncle Komui! He couldn't have been strong enough to defend himself like I can!" His tears started falling.

_Please, don't yell at me. I'm sorry..._

"What do you think he'll think of you now, huh? He's going to fear you and not trust you anymore because you attacked him!" Stacy pulled Jesus out of his blind fury by placing a hand on his shoulder. He glared at me before letting his head fall and he cursed quietly under his breath. I bit my lip and just stared at the ground between us in silence as his angered settled deep into my skin.

_I don't want you to hate me..._

"I think that's enough for now, boy," A familiar raspy voice said and made me bring my head up. It was Gramps with a hand on Jesus' shoulder and standing next to him as he silently cried,"You go get the other kids and go settle down. Your... father and I need to have a talk." Just great. I get to face what I've been trying to avoid the past couple of days. I watched as Jesus and Stacy turned to leave, and I caught Jesus' eyes right before he turned the corner. He was ashamed of me, I could tell...

"L-Look, Gramps, I-"

"Hush up and follow me," he hissed as he walked past me in the direction of the lower floor of the library (the floor right below where Allen and Two-Spot were). Taking a deep breath, I followed him. I took this moment to try and analyze how angry he was with me. His strides were quick and seemed set on helping him get his point across. His posture was perfect; almost too perfect. He didn't waver as he walked, nor did he turn his head to look at me. The solid silence between us definitely gave me the vibe that he was saving his anger-filled voice for later.

Yeah, he was _pissed._

Once we got into the library, he waited for me to come in before he slammed the door, the loud boom echoing throughout the wide room. I flinched when a soft wave of curious whispers followed once the rumble died down. I think I even heard Allen ask to see what was going on, but before I could really put much thought into it, Bookman kicked me in the shin and made me direct my attention to him.

"Ow, what the heck was that fo-" Another kick. I shut myself up before I let myself feel anymore pain. _Today's just not my day._

"What were you thinking, Lavi?" He yelled in an angry whisper.

"I-I dunno..."

"Not only do you slack off in your Bookman work, but you get yourself in a mess that multiplied _three hundred and twenty-four times._" I flinched at this. My kids aren't a mess...Are they? "What have I told you about getting attached to your history? Does anything I say get through that thick skull of yours?"

"This... can't count as history, can it? It's a minor detail, it shouldn't be that important. I can still stray a little, right?" This time, I braced myself before he hit me again, but it still hurt.

"What do you mean this doesn't count as history? Komui's theory on creating parasitic type users could make a huge difference in the way Innocence is perceived! This could be a turning point for the Black Order if they can somehow create strong enough Exorcists to fight this war, and you are telling me that this doesn't count as history?" His harsh whispers left me silenced, and I couldn't bring myself to look away from his angry eyes. He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose in irritation. I could hear him repeatedly whisper my name in a condescending tone, and the more he talked to himself, the more I started hating myself.

All of this was my fault. I seriously messed everything up...

"You do realize how serious of an issue this is for us, right?" He asked, this time in a normal (but still quite serious) tone. Hesitantly, I shook my head. I knew, but I didn't want to succumb to the consequences,"If you continue to screw up like this, we'll be forced to leave the Order. From here on out, I'm expecting less emotional attachment and more progress in your work as a Bookman."

"B-But, how am I supposed to become less emotionally attached..? I... I have a family..." I felt my throat go numb and I could feel tears welling up, but I refused to let them show in front of Gramps. I couldn't. Especially not after what he just told me...

"There are times when you have to learn to let things go, Lavi. After the past forty-eight times, I thought you would have realized this by now," His eyes bore holes in my head as he glared at me. He was right though,"You also need to remember that these kids are technically not real at all. They are merely experiments to test a theory on the evolution of Innocence, and you are to treat them as such." He turned away from me as he saw the defeat in my eyes,"I expect a big improvement in your behavior within the next few months. I'll play along for now, but this little chain of events you've started will cause us to leave this place sooner than I had planned." I let the tears fall a little as Bookman disappeared behind the shelves of books. I cursed and dropped to my knees, replaying what he told me over and over in my head. _I'm nothing but a failure..._

"Daddy, are you okay?" I flinched a little and looked up to see Yuca staring down at me with worry all over her face. I quickly wiped away the falling tears and beamed a wide smile.

"I-I'm fine. Just kinda hurt myself a little and my eyes watered...Why?" I really hope she didn't hear everything just a few seconds ago.

"Well I was on the other side of the library getting books and I heard the door slam... I got a little worried and went to check out my books quickly and came to see what happened."

"Yeah, that was me. I slammed the door on my fingers on accident. I'll be fine though. Thank you anyway, Yuca," I ruffled her short white hair and received a small blush and smile. I chuckled and looked over her shoulder at Bookman, who was eyeing me from where he stood between the high bookshelves. A pang of guilt struck me in the chest, and I pulled my hand away from Yuca slowly in defeat. She blinked and looked up at me, the worry coming back to her. My eyes were fixated on nothing in particular, but they were distracted alright. My mind was flooded with different thoughts and my heart was more like a raging storm of emotions. I couldn't decide on how to feel about the situation I was in, but one feeling that dominated over the rest really hit me hard.

I was defeated. I was trapped. Stuck. I don't know how to get out of this, nor do I know how to deal with it. I need help...

"Ah, hi Mama!" Yuca's voice snapped me out of my trance for the the second time today, and when I looked up I saw that white haired angel again... But he looked worried.

"You okay, Lavi? You're just...sitting there on the ground," He raised an eyebrow as he looked at me. I stared at him for a minute and studied him. I wasn't looking for anything in particular, but I found it sort of therapeutic staring at Allen. Just the fact that he was easy on the eyes kind of calmed the storm my mind and heart were in.

"...I'm fine, Sprout," I answered finally. He didn't seem to buy it, because right after I smiled, he knelt down beside me and flicked my forehead with a pout.

"Don't lie to me. I can tell when Daddy is lying just as easily as I can with Jesus," He smirked playfully, and I couldn't help but laugh. He complied with his own soothing laughter, then looked at me,"Link is letting me take a break, so wanna tell me what's wrong? It looks like it's pretty bad..." I felt my heart sink.

"It's... kinda hard to explain," I started. Allen looked at me quietly, then stood up and grabbed my arm to pull me up with him.

"We got time. Let's find a decent place to sit first though," He looked over at Yuca, who just stared at us obliviously,"You wanna join us?" _Good god, I hope not. It's hard enough thinking about explaining the previous situation to Allen, but _Yuca _too? I'ma die..._

"Nah, I've got a lot of books I wanna read, so I'm gonna go sit and start them now." She smiled and hugged me and Allen before running off and disappearing in the bookshelves once again.

"H-Hey, Allen, can we not talk in the library?" I blurted out. He looked at me and tilted his head.

"Why?"

"..." It took me a moment to think of a good way to explain my nervousness,"I'd rather talk in private than in a place where others can hear us. Especially Two-Spot."

Allen chuckled and turned for the door,"Alright then. We'll just walk around the Order, I guess." I nodded and tried to keep up with him as he semi-dragged me down the hall. Even after I paced myself in sync with him, his hand still clung to my sleeve. I couldn't help but smile, and I kept quiet about it to sort of savor the moment.

"Well, where to start..." I sighed, finally succumbing to defeat. Allen waited patiently for me to continue,"After you left, I asked Komui to explain the experiment to me..."

I took a while to explain the whole description to Allen, and at one point we even had to stop walking so I could break it down for him. I probably spent a good fifteen minutes trying to explain the whole thing to him, but by the time I stopped talking he understood.

"That's... crazy," He said with bewilderment,"It all fits so well, too."

I nodded and laughed at his expression,"Yeah, it was pretty crazy. He even demonstrated to me how powerful our kids were." I explained the knife trial and before I could even finish, I was jabbed in the ribs by the shorty's elbow.

"You idiot, why'd you throw a knife at Jesus? You don't throw knifes at Jesus!" He scolded. I threw my hands up in defense as he yelled.

"Hey, hey! He's fine, he dodged the knife!" Allen sighed in relief,"Well...to be honest, he deflected it, and he ended up wedging it between the bricks on the wall. That's some scary strength for an eight year old..." He seemed to agree, as he just stood there gaping at me. I chuckled and continued walking, and he followed suit.

"What else did I miss? It sounds like I missed a lot..." I frowned and ran a hand through my hair, letting out a deep sigh.

"Well... After all of that, I took Jesus, Pablo, and Stacy to the training grounds to test out their skills. A few other stray Exponents followed me, so in all I had about ten of them with me." He looked at me as I talked, letting me know I had his full attention (I kinda wish I didn't...),"I... uh..."

"...You what?"

I gulped a little as the nervousness came back to me,"I was... training with Pablo first, since Jesus wanted to sit out of the first round of training... It started off as fist fighting, and he's really good at it. He didn't get hit much, and even if I did land a hit, it didn't seem to hurt him because he'd hit me back twice as hard." I rubbed a spot on my head from where he kicked me then. Allen laughed at this and I pouted,"Anyway... I thought he'd be strong enough to dodge the attack of my hammer, so I went to swing lightly at him... b-but..." I choked up and stopped walking, rubbing my eye profusely as the tears came without warning. Allen turned to face me and watched as I broke down. It took him a while to comprehend, but I could tell it kicked in when I heard him whisper 'Y-You didn't...' _I did, and I regret it._

"I-Is he okay..?" He panicked, but I nodded as fast as I could respond.

"He's in the infirmary right now healing," I bit my lip after saying this, as it was still a really tender subject to be talking about. Allen just stared at me silently as I spoke,"He suffered some serious damage to his left eye, but other than that he was fine from what the nurse told me. He'll be outta there in a week."

"Oh..." was his only answer. Again, I felt my heart drop in the deep dark depths of my chest, and it really hurt.

"...You probably think I fail pretty badly, huh," I chuckled bitterly as I turned my blind side to him. I couldn't look him in the eyes; the eyes I would have stared into forever if time would allow it,"I'm a horrible person... I let my eagerness and excitement get the better of me, and in turn I just made our problems that much worse..." I could feel myself trembling slightly as I fought off the tears that threatened to fall once more. My whole body went numb as I silently wallowed in my own despair. I fail at everything, from fulfilling my duties as a Bookman to being a supportive father...

_I need help._

A soft and gentle touch gently brushed across my body as fragile arms wrapped around my waist and held me tightly,"Don't be so hard on yourself. Mistakes are common among the people in the Order, but that's how we learn and get stronger," His quiet voice was laced with reassurance and a sweetness not even the taste of liquid sugar could begin to cover. I bit my lip and blinked as a tear fell. Slowly, I lowered my head and rested it in the soft pillow of white. I wrapped my arms around his body and held him to me for support, for I'm sure even the slightest breeze would send me crumbling to the ground.

"But I... I failed," I finally muttered as the tears broke apart my speech,"I've failed as a Bookman and as a father. I... I can't..."

"Keep walking," Allen stopped me before I could tear myself apart anymore. His embrace tightened, but was still gentle and supportive,"Don't dwell on the mistakes you've made. Just move forward and better yourself along the way, and make your own path of success." I couldn't find any response to that, so I just left myself to be cradled in the arms of Allen Walker. He didn't seem to mind my silence though, and we stayed like that for quite a while. I replayed today's events in my head and despite how painful it all was, it helped calm me down. I chuckled bitterly once the tears stopped and I pulled away from Allen to wipe them away,"Hm?" He looked at me with an inquisitive look in his eyes.

"Nothing really..."

"Lavi, we've gone over this..." He pouted, and I just chuckled more.

"You know, Allen, our problems are like exponents," I started with a hollow smile. He looked at me again with a more puzzled expression, but I continued,"No matter what situation we're in, our problems are bound to just multiply by themselves again..."

The white haired exorcist was left silent at this comparison, then smiled,"That's what makes life interesting and fun, though."

"Yeah... I guess you're right." I sniffled a little as I tried to regain my composure. I blushed a bit too. The great Lavi Bookman Jr. just cried in front of Allen Walker... Man, I can just feel the manly points going down the drain,"Well, I guess your break has ended..." Allen frowned.

"Unfortunately, you're right..." He sighed and stretched a bit before turning in the opposite direction as me. A wave of nostalgia rushed through my body as I stood in place and listened to him walk away,"See you tomorrow, Lavi." He called. The footsteps started growing distant, and somehow it felt... painful.

I turned around and ran after Allen and grabbed his hand. He jumped a little at my touch and looked at me.

"L-Lavi?" I looked into his eyes, and that same feeling from my dream washed over me. The feeling of having everything I lacked and everything I wanted filled by the warmth and support his eyes gave away. I stared for a minute more, then finally snapped to and lowered the intensity of my eyes.

"If... If you ever need help, you know you can rely on me right?" I said finally. He stiffened a little in shock again and this time it was his turn to stare at me. I stayed determined to let him know I would always be there to help him, because I knew he needed it as much as I needed his help in return. He blushed a little and a smile broke the shock and filled his eyes with...a different emotion from that empty mirror.

Acceptance?

"Thank you, Lavi... I'll keep that in mind." he said gently. My expression softened as well and I smiled just as warmly. I let his hand slowly slip away from mine, savoring the moment of his warmth before his feathery touch left and I watched him leave. Although his response was brief, I could tell he truly meant it... The tone in his voice, the vivid sparkle in his eyes when I looked at him, and the slight quiver of his lips as he smiled...

_"Thank you, Lavi..."_ It replayed in my head, and a small sensitive tingle ran down my spine. For once, I felt like I did something right. For once, I felt like my life wasn't worthless and that I didn't have a future.

For once, it felt like things would be okay.

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><p>The week came and went and Pablo was finally able to leave the infirmary. Jesus was the first person to be at his bedside, clutching the blanket as he waited for his brother's eyes (er...eye) to open. I stood in the doorway and impatiently tapped my foot while I waited for him to wake up.<p>

And right on cue, Pablo shifted a little in his sleep. Jesus, who was silently crying and trying to hide it, looked up immediately and wiped his tears away to hide his 'weakness.' Pablo slowly awoke and his gray eye adjusted to the brightness of the room. With a groan, he sat up and rubbed his eye, then looked and saw Jesus. He immediately smiled.

"Hiya, Jesus..." he said with a scratchy voice. I couldn't really blame him for the weak voice, he had been asleep for a week...

Jesus immediately broke down and wrapped his arms around Pablo and held him tight. He didn't bother holding back his tears and he wailed loudly.

"You're...you're alive..." he managed to say through his hiccuping. Pablo couldn't do much except to hold Jesus as he shook from the violent sobs.

"Of course I'm alive. I'm tough just like my big brother, I wouldn't die on him like that..." He laughed a little,"You're strong too, Jesus, and you're my only big brother. I can't leave you that soon." He pulled back to smile at his big brother. Jesus just stared at Pablo with a shocked expression, and a light blush crept across his cheeks from his brother's words. His eyes glazed over with the overflowing tears, and he laughed as he wiped them away.

"T-Thank you, Pablo... I...I'm just glad you're okay..." Pablo just smiled in response, then turned his head as I walked in. I froze in my footsteps and looked at him. He had an eye patch over his left eye now from where I had hit him with the hammer spike. He looked so much like me as a little kid that it kind of hurt. I forced myself to keep walking though, because if I couldn't bring up the courage to apologize to my son, I couldn't move on with my life like I promised Allen I would, nor would I even forgive myself for the horrible thing I did.

"H-Hey, Pablo..." I greeted with a nervous smile. He just stared at me with that big round silver eye. I tensed up a little. _You're REALLY Allen's kid, man... _"U-Um... I just.. wanted to say I'm really sorry I did this to you, Pablo... I-I... don't know how to show you how... how incredibly sorry I am..." I felt the tears come up again, but I forced myself to hold them back. I punched myself mentally for it though, because I _really _wanted to cry. Holding back my tears hurt a lot more than letting myself cry (even though it also hurt to feel the manly points die as I did, but that's beside the point), but because of that freakin' Gramps, it was second nature to stop myself.

"¿Que dijiste?" I ended up doing a double take when I heard Pablo speak to me.

"Excuse me?"

"Estas perdonado," He said with a smile. I blinked and just looked at him shocked. Yeah, I could understand him, but it was a big surprise to hear him speaking Spanish like that. _Wasn't he just speaking English a minute ago?_

"C-Can you speak English, Pablo?" I asked him desperately. He just smirked.

"¿Que dijiste?" He repeated. I sulked.

"¿Puedes hablar en ingles?" I asked. Jesus stared at us with a lost look, but some of his expression showed he didn't really care. Pablo just laughed at me and hugged me.

"Te amo, Papa," He said with a smile in his voice. I felt my heart melt in my chest and I bit my lip to prevent myself from crying (it was a losing battle). I held Pablo close to me, not wanting to let him go in fear of looking up and seeing him in the hospital bed in pain again.

"Yo tambien te amo, Pablo," I responded with a warm smile. He laughed a little, amused by my Spanish. Jesus chuckled a little too.

"You two ready to speak English yet?" I laughed and beamed a wide smile.

"Sure, sure... If Pablo speaks English to me more often."

Said child looked at me and raised an eyebrow,"¿Que dijiste?" I sighed in defeat.

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><p>"You guys have fun, alright?" Allen smiled as he held a set of triplets in his arms. They all nodded in unison and jumped out of his arms toward the group of kids that were running around in the Science Division of the Black Order. I smiled proudly as I watched them all socialize and observe the scientists as they worked. Pablo was amongst the group of kids helping the scientists organize their papers, and I sighed contently to myself. Today officially marks one month since Pablo was taken off of bed rest for his eye to heal. He has been talking and spending more time with me lately, but he still refused to speak in English to me and Allen. It didn't bother me much, but it still infuriates Allen to the point where I'll hear small traces of his British accent season his words with a delicately spicy exoticness that made me smile way too easily. Sometimes I'd purposely have Pablo annoy Allen just to hear that accent, and man was it fun. Pablo had a lot of fun with it too.<p>

"Lavi?"

"Hm?"

"You ready to get going, or do you want a word with the kids before we leave?" I shook my head at the shorty's words.

"Nah, I'm good. Let's get going." Allen nodded in response and walked with me to Komui's office. Today was also the first day of school for the kids. Allen and I arranged for our friends in the Order to teach the kids basic school subjects to keep them occupied on days we had missions. We hoped it'd be good for them, and it would also give us a little bit of freedom too so we didn't have to have groups of kids at our sides while we were kicking akuma butt (haha! I've gotten better at censoring, go me!).

Before I could even enjoy the walk with Allen to the office, we were already standing there listening to his synopsis. I pouted a little. I wanted to enjoy the very rare private time I had with Allen. Because of Two-Spot and the kids, I can't get that anymore... It made me sad. What dampened my mood even more was the fact that Bookman kept me under constant evaluation as well, making sure that I was following his advice so that we could prolong our stay. He grew constantly angrier with me though, because I never changed. I still had my emotions, and they definitely showed whenever Allen brought up Link or when the kids would fight over attention.

"...Lavi."

_Dang Two-Spot being the freaky creeper... Always hogging up Allen's time and never leaving his side. Urgh, that pisses me off..._

"L-Lavi?"

_As much as I love my children, I do enjoy my moments to myself. I'm almost even grateful for isolating myself to my work as a Bookman... It's what I grew up doing after all, and I do love it very much... If only I could do my job while keeping my memories and feelings closer to me..._

"Lavi!"

"Y-yeah?"

"You ready to go?" Allen looked at me impatiently.

I laughed,"Of course, Sprout! I know you're eager to get out there on the battlefield, hold your horses!"

"My name is _Allen!_" he groaned as we walked out of the room. I just chuckled a response and followed my partner down to the Black Order's underground waterway system to begin our mission.

The bullets whistled through the air as they missed their target, which happened to be me at that moment. I cursed myself and my inaccuracy in the dark as I kept tripping and stumbling around in the large forest our mission's location was in. We were deep in the forests somewhere in Germany investigating the mystery of the 'Whispering Wind.' We were told that townspeople from the nearby village who passed by this forest would be whisked away and never returned. Me being the lovable dumbass I was, I succumbed to the wind's voice, and I'm now stuck fighting the akuma that were swarming around the area in search of the Innocence while Allen was nowhere to be found.

"Nyahahaha!" the level three akuma cackled as it continued to fire bullets from its machine gun-like arm,"Run, little flea, run!" I ran as fast as I could carry myself, but ended up running into a tree in the low, hazy darkness that hung on its branches. Before I could react, I heard Allen cry out as he slashed at the akuma's arm, severing it on the spot with his sword.

"It's about time you showed up, Sprout!" I panted as I rubbed my head. He just laughed.

"I apologize, Lavi. I'll try to save you sooner next time."

I pouted and got up from the forest ground and reached for my hammer at my side,"Big hammer, little hammer, grow, grow, _GROW!_" On command, my weapon quadrupled in size. With a firm grip, I leaped onto the tree's branches and worked my way up until I reached the clear sky above where the akuma was floating. I swung my hammer down on the akuma's head and sent him plummeting to the forest ground below. As I returned full swing, Allen jumped up to meet the end of my hammer as well. He turned himself so his feet landed on the face of the hammer, then used the hammer's momentum to further increase his own speed. He gripped his sword tightly, then with a swift motion he struck the akuma in the gut.

"May your soul find salvation..." he muttered quietly as the akuma exploded beneath his blade. I landed on the branches above him and watched as his sword reverted back to his left arm, the smooth black skin glowing very faintly in the moonlight. I smiled.

"Glad that was the last of them. Did you find the Innocence?" I asked him as I jumped down from the tree branch.

"Yep, we can head back home now," He said returning the smile. I put my hammer away and walked with Allen out of the once enchanted forests back to the place we could call home.

"Welcome home, mom and dad!" The kids greeted excitedly as they always did when we were out on missions. I just about melted inside and gathered up a bunch of the kids in a big ol' bear hug.

"Thank you, kids!" I sang happily. Allen just rolled his eyes and laughed at me, then turned to Komui.

"Here's the Innocence we retrieved." Komui took the mystical object and examined it. His eyes widened a little bit behind his glasses.

"That's strange..." He muttered and retreated back to his desk. Allen and I looked at him suspiciously.

"Something wrong?" Allen spoke up.

"This Innocence looks like it's incomplete," Komui observed,"It's like any other raw Innocence we've seen, but under closer inspection, it looks like part of it is missing from its material..."

My and Allen's eyes met in a mutually confused look, then returned to Komui.

"Is it faulty?"

"I don't think so. If anything, this might mean the user is nearby, and the Innocence is slowly reacting to them." Just then, the Innocence in the Supervisor's hands began to glow in a blinding white light. We shielded our eyes in an attempt to protect them, but the light was overbearing.

"W-What's going on..?" I asked as I tried to look at the glowing Innocence.

"I think the Innocence found its user!" Komui said, as he too was shielding his eyes. We looked around though, and we couldn't see anyone around that could be the user.

That is, until someone's soft and gentle voice came humming down the hall to the office.

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><p><strong>Ah, finally finished! Hope you guys enjoy this! I had a lot of fun writing it. It might be a little jumpy, but I wanted to include a little more development here. Also, I apologize if the Spanish is wrong. I don't speak Spanish, and I had my friends help me with it. Sorry to those of you who don't speak Spanish either, but I think the words are simple enough for you to get a vague translation of what they mean. :)<strong>

**I look forward to your reviews! The more reviews I get, the more motivation I have to update sooner!**


	6. Happy Birthday

**All important Author's Notes are at the bottom of this chapter.**

**Shout-Outs: BrokenHeartedExorcist, Lingering Sorrow, Chibi Moko-chan, the-not-so-innocent-uke, and DR. EPIC.**

**WARNIN****G: This story contains yaoi (Laven). It's not too bad. It's may be more of a Bromance, but that is subject to change as the story progresses.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own D. Gray-Man. *sad face***

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><p><strong>Chapter Six: Happy Birthday<strong>

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><p>"Twinkle, twinkle little star<br>How I wonder what you are  
>Up above the world so high<br>Like a diamond in the sky~"

As the child's voice became louder, the Innocence's light pulsated to the beat of the nursery rhyme. I directed my attention toward the door to see who it was that was controlling the Innocence. Allen turned his head at the same time and he was surprised to see Malissa walking into the office with a cat in her arms.

"Daddy, Mommy, look!" she held the cat up to us, and just then, the Innocence lost its powerful glow and died back down to a dull shimmer,"I found a kitty cat! It's cute!"

"Well, would ya look at that!" Komui chuckled, though I'm pretty sure he wasn't talking about the cat. I stood there gaping at my little girl for what felt like forever.

"She's an Innocence accommodator?" I exclaimed. Malissa looked at me with bright teal eyes of curiosity.

"Wassat?" she asked and pet the kitten in her arms. Allen decided to distract her and went on about how cute the white fluff ball was (although in reality it looked kind of pitiful and homeless).

"Yes, it appears so... If you look closely, you can see the Innocence starting to disintegrate," Komui said and held up the raw material. I looked at it and he was right. The Innocence was breaking itself down as we spoke, dissolving itself into small particles in the air. I panicked a little and held my breath in fear of inhaling foreign little dust particles. Komui saw this and laughed,"Don't worry, the Innocence won't enter our bodies if we aren't the accommodators. If anything, Malissa will have breathed in the Innocence completely by the time she leaves."

"Oh okay... But I thought she was a parasitic type?" I looked at him confused.

"She still is. What you brought back from your mission was the Innocence in its raw material form. Malissa probably already had small traces of matured Innocence within her that evolved from the Child's Innocence she has. This is the remaining piece she needs to become a parasitic type accommodator," Komui closed his hand into a loose fist as the last of the raw material Innocence vanished into the air,"I'll talk to Lenalee about helping Malissa with vocal training to help her tame the Innocence in her voice. As you probably noticed from before, it's still highly unstable and may react to anything she says at any given time."

I nodded and watched as Allen and Malissa were engaged in their own little conversation.

"That'll have to wait though. I have some papers to help Reever and Johnny grade since it was the kids' first day of school today." Hearing this, I beamed a wide smile and bounced up and down in excitement.

"Oh yeah! I forgot about that! Allen, Allen, ALLEN!" I grabbed the white haired exorcist's hand and pulled him up from the ground (he was sitting on the ground playing with the kitten),"We needa go check on the rest of the kids! I wanna hear about what they learned on their first day of school!" He laughed at me and gently slipped his hand out of mine.

"I'll join you in a minute, I need to go with Malissa to get this cat cleaned up..." He smiled and took the kitten from Malissa's arms and petted him. The baby cat purred and nuzzled Allen's hand for the warmth and protection it offered. I raised an eyebrow and looked at him with an amused smirk creeping across my lips.

"You want a pet cat, huh?"

"I-It's not for me, it's for Malissa. B-Besides, I don't want to have another cat eating Timcanpy again..."

"Mhm. Sure." I caught that stutter. He wants to keep the cat, and I knew it.

We said our goodbyes to Komui and walked out of the office, then went our separate ways to deal with our own little errands. As soon as I reached the Science Department, I was bombarded by a bunch of little kids with smiles on their faces. They each told me about their day at school and how much fun it was (well, most of them enjoyed it. Others like Jesus and Micah didn't like it so much). Some of them even recapped on the little things they learned and even schooled me. I thought it was very cute how much of a confidence boost this gave them and how this helped them get along with everyone in the Order. I could definitely tell they were slowly blending into the daily in's and out's of the Black Order by the way the staff handled the kids and how the kids complied. It made me feel happy inside knowing they'd fit in fine, and it made me even happier knowing this meant that my big happy family was increased by that many more people.

By the time the kids wore themselves out by telling their stories it was time for bed. They eagerly followed their new chaperons for the day and went to bed accordingly. I said my farewells and good nights to each and every child before I, too, retired to the library to sleep. I wasn't too sleepy yet, though, so I decided to read the book Allen recommended for me to read for fun (no, we never did get to settle that quarrel of ours over that matter).

As I was reading, I felt soft white gloved hands obscure my vision.

Soft, sweet laughter,"Guess who."

"Hmm... Lenalee?"

Another snort of laughter,"Guess again."

"Uhm... Lou Fa?"

I could hear the irritation in the person's voice,"Try again."

"I'm running out of girls though, and I doubt this is a guy..." I smirked playfully. The hands were removed from my eyes and I felt a soft thwack on my head.

"You're a jerk, Lavi! I'm not _that _girly! I'm just a bit...small for my age," He admitted reluctantly. I threw my head back in laughter.

"You got that right, Sprout!" I grinned up at him and he pouted more. _Ahh, so cute..._

He hopped over the back of the couch and sat next to me,"Shut up, that's not what I meant..."

"Haha, I'm sorry. You're just really easy to pick on sometimes," I wrapped an arm around him and pulled him into a hug. He turned his body slightly so that his back faced me a bit more than I wanted.

"Don't talk to me, you're mean," He huffed and pouted. I frowned and looked at him.

"What? I'm not mean, I'm awesome." He turned his head away from me and I could tell he was trying to resist the urge to smile (and was failing). I smirked and used my free hand to poke his side. He yelped at my touch and edged away from my hand in fear of another assault. I smirked at this,"You're ticklish?"

"Don't do it." _He didn't deny it!_

I showed no mercy as I grabbed Allen by the waist and tickled him until his fragile pale skin turned pink from laughing so hard. Tears started to form in his eyes from laughing, and after a while I started laughing as well.

"S-Stop it! A-Ahaha, Lavi, stop, I can't breathe!" He gasped between bouts of laughter. I chuckled and sat up, pulling my arms away and allowing him room to sit up again to catch his breath. He wiped the little beads of tears from his eyes and sighed a deep sigh of bittersweet defeat. I smiled at him.

"Do you love me again?"

"Go away." He laughed and pushed me gently. I laughed as well and wrapped my arms around him in another bear hug.

"You can't deny it, I'm lovable! There's no way you can ignore me," He blushed a little bit and let out a small laugh.

"Alright, alright, Lavi," he said and slipped out of my hug,"You win. For now." I smirked and relaxed on the couch. He stood up to go sleep on the recliner, but I frowned and pulled on his sleeve before he could move.

"Why are you walking toward the recliner?" I asked him with a slight pout. He blushed a little bit and rubbed the back of his neck with his free hand.

"W-Well I thought you would be more comfortable sleeping on the couch by yourself without me sleeping on top of you all the time..." He averted his eyes as he said the last part. I blushed a little bit as I thought about it. It was true that lately we'd just crash on the couch together due to one brotherly argument or another. It almost became a routine, actually.

This just made me laugh more and I pulled Allen back in for another hug,"If I minded, I would've told you so a lot earlier, Sprout. It's been how long now? A month?" I smiled down at him with the brightest, happiest smile I've had in a while,"I don't mind at all. You can't deny it's sort of become a routine for us." He snorted and blushed a little, resting his head against me.

"Y-Yeah, I guess you're right..." He said quietly before sitting with me on the couch in a comfortable silence. I was about to fall asleep when I felt a book thump lightly on the top of my head. I looked up and saw Howard Link hovering over Allen and me. I scowled and resisted the urge to jump up and throw him somewhere so I could enjoy this moment longer.

"I'd appreciate if you kept your voice down in the library, Mr. Lavi Bookman Jr.," He said in that snobby ass tone of his. I glared at him.

"I'd appreciate it if you'd leave, but we can't always have our way, can we?" I shot back. He rolled his eyes and directed his attention to Allen, ignoring my existence altogether (the jerkface!).

"Mr. Walker, I think it would be wise for you to sleep in your room tonight rather than the library. It's not exactly the most suitable place to sleep anyway, and it's my duty to-"

"No thank you." He said simply, his eyes still closed as he rested against me. Timcanpy was on his head making himself comfortable too, only to prove Allen's point that he wanted to stay. Still, Two-Spot persisted.

"You don't understand, it is my duty to keep watch of you at all times and to look out for your well-being. I highly advise you to retire to your room."

"If you cared for my well-being, you'd let me stay here," Allen said with a yawn that slurred his words,"Besides, I think it's a little creepy that you want me to sleep in my own room for your twenty-four hour surveillance..." He looked up at Link and examined him for a minute,"Hmm..." He stroked an imaginary beard of his and looked at Link suspiciously.

"Now that you mention it, I get the same vibe too, Sprout..." I looked at Link too and copied Allen's actions. Link fidgeted under our gaze.

"I-It's not as creepy as it sounds! These were orders from Leverrier himself! He wants me to keep a close eye on you to make sure you don't do anything suspicious!"

"What suspicious things could I possibly do in a room where my kids are, much less in a library?" Allen raised an eyebrow,"Suspicious..." Link sighed as his tolerance level obviously started to plummet.

"Look, I've been very lenient with you and your three hundred something-"

"Three hundred and twenty-four." I cut in, just to make my presence known. Link shot me with his eyes, but I ignored the hostility (I found it quite endearing).

"Your _three hundred and twenty-four _kids, and it's about time you show me and my work some respect. Some day soon, I will start taking better action to get you to obey my orders, and I'm sure Bookman wouldn't mind helping me out," He glanced at me for half a second, then returned his eyes to Allen. They shared a mutually murderous glare toward each other before Link turned and left in a swift stride. The echo of the library door closing was followed by a soft blanket of darkness and a soothing silence. Allen's disgruntled sigh broke the peaceful moment however.

"That guy is really getting on my nerves..." He mumbled as he adjusted himself on the couch. I shifted too to make the adjustment process easier, and soon we were laying comfortably on the couch like we normally did.

"You're telling me? I'm about ready to go off on him. He's driving me nuts..." I pouted, and I could hear Allen chuckling at my childish response.

"I'm sorry... Eventually he'll be gone though."

"I hope so..." That was the last thing I said before another comfortable silence filled the air again. My eyes felt heavy as the silence hushed my mind and willed me to sleep...

Until Allen started fidgeting a little bit.

"Hm?" I looked down at the white haired boy.

"Hm? Oh, nothing. Just can't sleep..."

"What's wrong?"

"Just tense. I dunno why..."

"Need a massage or something?"

"That's awkward..." Allen said with a small laugh. I snorted and smirked.

"It'll help though." I yawned. Man, the sleep is getting to me.

"...I-I guess so then." _D'aww, he's all hesitant and nervous and stuff. That's so adorable._

Despite how right Allen was in this process being awkward, I could tell he was really grateful for the gesture. In less than five minutes of gently massaging his shoulders and back, I could feel his soft snores brush against my neck and he finally relaxed. I smiled, then nuzzled myself to him and fell fast asleep as well.

It was needless to say what I dreamed of that night...

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><p>This routine continued for quite a while. Allen and I definitely fell accustomed to it, as we followed the same basic routines for months and months on end, until it finally became a year since we became the parents of our Exponents. Over the course of the year, I became really interested in sharing my love for history to the Exponents. I would stay home and head to the Science Department to pass on what I knew (in as simple terms as I could muster) to the kids, and from then on I began neglecting my duties as a Bookman and as an Exorcist. I didn't do it on purpose, honest, but it was really hard balancing out all three roles at once; being a reliable father, Bookman's successor, and an Exorcist of the Black Order. Without a doubt, though, I found that being a father was the funnest for me. It was most likely because I could be what I was taught not to be... Loving, caring, emotionally attached to my kids, and not care about every little detail in the lives of every single person around me. It was a really hard job to maintain, but I enjoyed it...<p>

Until I was reminded just how hard my many jobs were.

"Jerry, hurry up!" I called through the kitchen window.

"Now now, hold up, Lavi! It takes a lot of concentration and love to make a cake _this _big!" The chef called from within his culinary sanctuary. I sighed impatiently and began pacing around the cafeteria while I waited on the cake. I scanned every possible inch of the room for a flaw in decoration, layout, and guest for the umpteenth time that morning. Seeing no flaw to correct, I sighed again and quickened my pacing. As I did so, a foreign object (a foot, maybe?) made its way beneath me and swept me off my feet. It caught me off guard and I faceplanted on the hard ground with a loud and painful _thud._

"Stop your pacing, Stupid Rabbit! It's annoying as hell and it's giving me a headache," Yuu grumbled in his usual morning mood. I pouted and sat up while rubbing my nose.

"But Yuu, I need to make sure everything is perfect! Today is my children's birthday!" I whined and wrapped my arms around his leg and clung to him,"You should be proud of me too. This is the first time in a long, _long _while that I actually bothered to plan out every detail well in advance! I want everything to be absolutely perfect for my kids!"

"Get off," His eyes narrowed and stabbed me with daggers of intense hate and annoyance, but I paid it no mind. I knew deep down he cared for the kids just as much as me, Allen, and Lenalee did. He even seemed to form special under-the-table friendships with some of the kids.

"B-But I need support right now, Kanda... Hug me?" It was around this time where I was grateful for my fast reflexes. If I had moved a millisecond later, I would have had my head cut off by Mugen. I ran out of harm's way and found Komui finishing his breakfast.

"Hey, Komui, did you speak to Lenalee yet?" I asked as I took a seat next to him. He nodded as he washed down the last forkful of his breakfast with a swig of his morning coffee.

"I spoke with her a few minutes ago actually. She and Allen are on their way back with the kids now." I grinned from ear to ear when I heard this. Allen and I planned this a day before, where he and Lenalee (along with many other chaperons) would take the kids out for a day of fresh air and exploration. They went shopping around town and then camped out in the forest not too far from where the Black Order was, and now they were on their way back for a big surprise! I was absolutely ecstatic, because I wanted to see all of their smiles and the excitement wash across their little faces... Thinking about it made me smile so hard my cheeks started to hurt.

"Ahh, I can't wait! This is gonna be so much fun!" Komui laughed at my excitement.

"It seems you've planned this quite well, Lavi. You really are excited for today, aren't you?"

I blushed in embarrassment and rubbed the back of my neck,"W-Well... I didn't have very exciting birthdays until I joined the Order. My first year here was the best I've had by far, and I wanted theirs to be just as special."

Komui smirked a little and clapped a hand on my shoulder,"Well you're certainly doing a fine job as a father supporting your kids and making sure they remain happy. I'm quite proud of you." The blush darkened and I smiled and thanked him. To be honest, I had no idea what the heck I was doing. I was just going by what I learned I didn't have and giving it to the kids. Sometimes this worked, other times it didn't and put them in danger in one way or another. Nonetheless, I definitely learned a lot from parenting, and I'm sure Allen did too.

After talking to Komui for a while longer, I decided to head over to meet up with Allen and Lenalee at the gate. As soon as I opened it, I was met with a flash of white crashing into me and holding me in a tight hug.

"We're back home!" the person sang cheerfully. I was half expecting it to be one of the Exponents, but in reality, it was Allen himself. He wore an angelic, almost illegally happy smile on his face. His eyes were bright and sparkling with life and excitement. This was probably the first time I've ever seen him look so openly happy. I chuckled and ruffled his hair.

"Welcome back, Sprout!" He pouted at this, but brushed it aside as Lenalee, Reever, Johnny, Tapp, Krory, Miranda, and Marie trailed up with all of the kids marching behind them. I stepped up and made eye contact with Jesus once he was close enough,"Hey, Jesus! Head count!"

He nodded, then turned around and relayed the message and shouted his number. One by one, the kids read off their numbers until all of them where called out. I nodded with a satisfied grin on my face.

"Welcome back home, kids," I called to all of them,"And happy birthday!" They all jumped up in happy excitement with bursts of thank you's and I love you's. Lenalee giggled a little at their bursts of energy.

"I think you should have saved that for when they get inside the building, Lavi," she said.

I scoffed,"Haha, let them have their fun, Lena. They'll be all tuckered out in no time, I promise."

"I hope you're right, Lavi, these guys were quite hyper on their little vacation," Allen commented with a slightly distressed look on his face. I stifled a laugh and ruffled his hair, then led the group inside for the party.

It was a _blast. _As soon as the kids filed into the cafeteria, Jerry (with the help of Kanda and Komui) wheeled in the birthday cake. It towered over the kids and even us adults. They all gaped at the huge mound of sugary goodness with eager and hungry eyes. Allen and I stepped in front of the presentation and smiled lovingly at the kids.

"Happy Birthday!" We sang in unison. The children each took turns giving hugs to us, then moved onto spreading the love to the rest of the family. Jerry was busy slicing the cake and dishing out pieces for everyone. They all seemed to really enjoy the cake, as they were already begging for more as they each finished their own one by one. To distract them from their hunger, Allen moved the party onto the mini-games we had planned together. He explained the details of a scavenger hunt for patrol golems around the Order, and as he was wrapping up the rules they were already separating themselves into groups and running around the Order looking for said golems. Allen sighed and looked at me with an exhausted smile. I returned the smile with one of my own along with a one armed hug.

"You okay, Sprout? You look pretty exhausted."

"My name is Allen," He said automatically,"And I am exhausted, but I'll be fine."

"You sure?" I asked him with rising concern.

"Mhm. This day is important for the kids, and I wanna make sure it's as special for them as you want it to be, too." His soft lips curled up into his signature smile. I chuckled and ruffled his hair up.

"Ahhh, you're too adorable, Sprout!" I stuck out my tongue playfully as he ducked out of my arms and fixed his hair. Lenalee's laugh broke our moment of playfulness.

"You two have grown pretty close to each other since the Exponents were born," She observed with a devious smile. Allen and I shared an equally bright blush.

"W-What's that supposed to mean?" Allen asked nervously.

"Mm, nothing," she sang with a hint of mischief in her words. My face must have blended in with my hair, because my eyes started to water a little from how hot my face felt. I didn't think my feelings for Allen were that obvious to everyone. I need to be more careful, or else the wrong people will take notice to them...

Ah, who was I kidding? The wrong people have already taken notice to my feelings...

"Anyway," Lenalee said as she waved her hand in a gesture to change the subject,"Lavi, Bookman said he needed to speak to you about some paperwork that had to be done in the library." I nodded and said my byes as I headed for the library. As I stood in front of the door, I was caught within the storm of my thoughts...

Bookman couldn't possibly be calling me here _just_ because of some paperwork that had to be done. There must have been another reason. Was it because of me and Allen? Or was it because I've been neglecting my work as a Bookman? Is he gonna try to take my kids away from me...? I don't want that to happen... My fists were clenched so tightly that my knuckles turned white and my whole arm was shaking from the tension. I drew in a deep breath and opened the door.

I was greeted with a tiny foot to my face kicking me with the force of a thousand raging panda bears high on bamboo leaves. As I crashed to the floor, I looked up at the old man who attacked me. He didn't look very happy at all.

"It's about time you actually showed up for work." He said with an icy edge. I grunted in response and sat up rubbing my nose,"You're slacking severely, Lavi. It's beginning to worry me."

"How is it worrying you? I'm doing fine in my studies." I countered.

"That's what you think! You're far behind in your studies, and I've yet to see any progress in your translated texts. The books I've assigned you to read and translate into English and Latin aren't even halfway done, and the ancient scripts don't even look like they've been touched at all!" _Ain't that the point...?_

"I'm getting to it! I promise I'll get to it tonight!" I growled in irritation. My blood was beginning to boil from the constant nagging, and to be honest it did _not _feel very pleasant at all. I ran a hand through my hair and took a deep breath as I stood up,"Look, I'm already running errands right now, so I'll come back later tonight to finish my work, okay Gramps? You know I get my work done eventually."

"'Eventually' sometimes isn't good enough," He snarled while he looked me in the eye. I've had just about enough of him, so I stormed back toward the cafeteria to my dear children.

I will admit, I felt bad leaving my studies behind. I loved being a Bookman, I truly did, but it was so hard keeping up with everything while raising three hundred twenty-four children... I stopped walking and stood still in the hallway. What am I doing? What am I? Is this what I really want to be? Do I want to be free and live a life so foreign, so distant from what I've ever dreamed of? Or do I want to live the life I was taught to live and came to love? With another heavy, disgruntled sigh I fell to my knees and pulled at my fiery red locks in frustration.

What do I want to do?

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><p>Pushing the raging war of thoughts to the back of my mind, I came back to the cafeteria with a big smile on my face. The kids had just finished their little scavenger hunt and were now fawning over the new uniforms the big ol' family gave them as a birthday present. I stayed and spent some time with each of my kids and managed to sneak in time to talk to Allen while Link was being distracted by a group of Exponents that grew attached to him. It felt nice being with the kids and Allen. The company gave me a sense of comfort. It felt...<p>

God dang it there I go again. I lost my train of thought...

"Hey Daddy, I have a surprise for you!" Micah called from the little pool of Exponents surrounding Allen and me. We both directed our attention at him, and I kind of cringed when I saw him smirking. His hands were held behind his back as if he were hiding something.

"Y-Yeah, Micah- HMMRF!" I tasted a creamy vanilla frosting and inhaled a whole lot of sugar as my face was plastered with a large slice of the cake Jerry spent all day making. As it slid off my face, I glared down at the laughing Micah with an emerald eye of annoyance and embarrassment.

"...Hey, Micah," I muttered in a soft but eerie tone. I saw Allen back away from the corner of my eye as he saw what I was up to. Before the boy could reply, I smeared cake all over his face until he looked identical to me. I smirked triumphantly while he just pouted feeling challenged.

"You're not nice," He muttered as he pouted. I couldn't help but burst out laughing. Suddenly my face was met with more cake, and all I can hear is Allen's voice ringing in beautiful laughter.

"You shouldn't let your guard down like that La-" _SCORE. _Before Allen could finish, he too was met face to face with a massive piece of cake (I had to duck, of course, but you get the point, right?). The Exponents around us laughed and started grabbing any item of food they could and threw it at the nearest person to them. In no time flat, the whole cafeteria was caught up in a huge food fight with flying cake, forks, plates, and cups everywhere. It's been a long time since I've had this much fun in the Black Order, I'll have to admit. Lately, it's been nothing but serious business and bad news left and right. Ever since the Exponents were born though, we've been able to remember the good times and cheer up a bit in this war... Maybe things will be okay.

While I slipped away from the food-filled war zone to allow myself some time to relax, I could feel a cold stare piercing me through my soul. I looked up and caught Bookman's gaze, and instantly I felt my whole world come crashing down around me. He looked at me with hazy eyes, as if they were looking at someone who just stabbed him in the back. His lips pursed in a firm line and I saw him heave a deep, weary sigh. His eyes never left me though, and just through looks alone I could feel the seed of guilt settle deep within my heart... It hurt a lot. Not long after the guilt set in, I could feel that I had a big smile plastered on my face from all the fun, and it instantly vanished when I saw his look harden. I didn't think it would be such a big deal, but seeing Bookman look so ashamed and hurt made me feel just as bad about myself. I opened my mouth to say something, but he raised his hand and silenced me from where he was. Seeing as I couldn't really do anything to retort with, I shut my mouth and just watched as he turned around and left. I sat there for a moment and stared at the ground at my feet. _Guess my time is up..._

With a heavy sigh I lifted myself to my feet and walked off and took a shower, then after getting dressed I headed down to the library as quickly as I could. Upon entering, I could hear the soft scratching of pen and against paper and the turning of fragile pages of books decades old. I held my breath as I walked in and went straight to my desk to do my work. I could feel Bookman's eyes on me as I sat down and opened my books. It's as if they were burning holes into my head and prodding at my brain, picking at every little nerve until I snapped and looked up.

"What?"

"I wasn't expecting you to come back. You seemed quite _happy_ leaving your Bookman duties behind," He spat his words with quite a lot of acid.

I gritted my teeth,"And what happened to _you_ saying you would help me with my and Allen's situation, huh? You agreed this wouldn't be easy, and you agreed we'd stay until this all cleared up! What happened to the support?"

"I wasn't expecting you to lose yourself to those pesky little nuisances! They're not even your real kids, Lavi, they're mere experiments made by the Black Order!" He slammed his book shut to look at me, and Lord knows I wish he hadn't. His words alone left a third degree burn on my heart,"I've been very lenient with you and your behavior lately, but now is where I draw the line. You're completely forbidden from having any sort of interaction with the experiments or Allen Walker. Do I make myself clear?"

"Why you little-"

"_Do I make myself clear?_" He asked again. My whole body shook with pure rage, but I mustered all of my willpower not to go off on Bookman. He didn't deserve it. I know he didn't. Without another word, I nodded and sat down at my desk to do my work.

**000  
><strong>

It had been hours since I left the cafeteria, and already it felt like I had wasted a year of my life burying myself in books and papers. Bookman seemed satisfied with my performance though. Almost immediately after I had sat down, I was back to my old self - emotionless and hardworking. The library was quiet and there was a quiet hum as the air conditioning kicked itself into gear. I sighed and ran a hand through my hand for the umpteenth time and stared at the clock. It was getting late. The day was almost over.

"I think you've done enough for today, Lavi,"Bookman said finally. I looked at him for a moment, but he didn't return the look. Taking this as my ticket out of the library I slowly got up and stretched. A yawn escaped from my lips when I felt the ground shake from beneath me. _That...is not normal at all._ Bookman and I shared a look at each other, then ran out of the library. We looked down the hall and instantly we were blinded with a burst of light and a loud explosion rang in our ears.

"No... No no no no..." I repeated over and over again as I stared at the rubble in front of me. Hidden in the wispy smoke of the attack was a level two akuma. Slowly but surely, more and more came pouring into the halls,"It's an ambush...!" I instantly grabbed my hammer and enlarged it, pushing back the hordes of akuma coming after us.

"Lavi, go check on everyone in the cafeteria, I'll hold them off here..!" Bookman commanded. I didn't need to wait for him, however, as I was already making a mad dash for the doors of the cafeteria. I prayed to God that everyone was okay...

As I opened the doors to the cafeteria, everyone was still there and unaffected by the ambush. They all looked startled from the distant explosions and loud noises coming from outside, but no one was harmed.

"Lavi, what's going on?" Allen asked as he caught up to me. I was panting too hard to speak properly, but I didn't care.

"Th-There.. There are hordes of a..akuma coming to a-ambush HQ..." I broke in between pants. He cursed under his breath and looked at the many scared children before us. The Communication Chain of Exponents were the only ones who seemed to be calm and collected, aside from Malissa who was crying helplessly in Neah's arms,"We should be safe here... They haven't re-"

I spoke too soon. A giant drill akuma crashed through the wall of the cafeteria and just barely missed a group of people standing there. Everyone was riddled with panic and fear as the akuma cackled and lashed out and anyone and anything within its radius. Allen sprang into action and activated the Crown Clown, immediately jumping between the akuma and the people he loved so dearly.

"Lavi! Get everyone to safety, I'll try to hold off the akuma..!" He shouted as his arm turned into the sword he used at the Ark. Kanda and the other able-bodied exorcists accompanied Allen in fending off the akuma that were infesting the cafeteria. I nodded and with the help of the CC (Communication Chain), I guided all of the kids out of the cafeteria through the back hall that wasn't being attacked by anything yet. It was eerily quiet and I could feel my stomach twist itself in a knot as a bad feeling set in, but I had to go through with it. Taking a leap of faith, I quickly herded the kids through the labyrinth of halls to the infirmary where Finders had it blocked off already to keep the akuma out. The end was in sight and I couldn't help but smile in relief as the kids quickly filed into the infirmary.

However, my rejoicing didn't last long since the Nurse stopped the kids from coming into the room.

"I'm sorry, but there's no more room for all of you..." she said with a solemn tone. I looked at her horrified.

"What? But.. they need to stay out of danger..! I can't just leave them out here!" I pleaded, trying to press her to let more in. She denied my requests though.

"I'm sorry, but no more will fit..." She sighed,"The other infirmary on the other side of the Black Order has Finders setting up barriers as well. Maybe if you can lead the rest of the children there?" I looked behind me at the kids shaking and huddling close to each other in fear. The number was reduced to about half, but it was still quite a lot of children to guide. I had to do it though. There wasn't any other choice. I sighed and thanked the nurse for the help, then guided the kids as fast as I could down the halls. It bothered me how insanely quiet and calm it was in the halls. It was so quite, I could hear each and every child's individual footsteps echo throughout the structure of the Order. Yucca was the only one of the CC that was left with me. The rest were safe in the other infirmary.

"Dad, how far is this other infirmary?" She asked me as she ran beside me. Despite her being so small and fragile, she definitely did well keeping up with the adults. She reminded me so much of Allen with the way she works so hard and how polite she is to everyone. I've seen how the other Exponents interact with her, and she definitely fit the role of Big Sister. She was usually the one to separate Jesus and Stacy in their daily quarrels, the one to calm Malissa when she would hurt herself and start crying, and the one to help teach the younger Exponents in school. They all definitely looked up to her and trusted her greatly.

"We shouldn't be too far from it actually. I'm surprised nothing's happened," I answered as we slowed our pace to let the kids rest and not over exert themselves. Yucca nodded.

"It is a little nerve wracking..." she mumbled as she looked around the Order suspiciously. It was still really quiet despite the distant explosions and crashes coming from below, where the akumas' ambush began. She looked at the Exponents and made sure they were all still together, then gave me the okay to continue.

We ran for about five more minutes when my stomach began developing another knot and wringing itself painfully inside me. I could sense something bad was about to happen. I knew it... I don't know what it is, but I know there's going to be something bad happening.

Right on cue, from the corner of my eye I saw a blast of dark energy whistle harshly through the air right toward us. I tried reaching for my hammer to knock it away, but I was seconds too late...

I couldn't tell what was more painful; hearing the explosion and witnessing the aftermath before me, or feeling that same explosion within me shattering my heart to pieces. I sat there on my knees shaking uncontrollably. The smoke from the explosion wrapped around my body in desperate attempts to suck me into the destruction. I looked wide eyed before me and right at my knees, a fragile disembodied hand lay lifeless and spread out as if reaching for help. The help came too late... A lump formed in my throat as I slowly trailed my fingers over the rubble and touched the child's hand. It was cold and haunting as my rough and calloused hand ran softly over the smooth skin of the hand of the little girl that was once at my side...

Written on the hand of the little girl was the number twenty-three, the ink smeared slightly signifying a little bit of wear and tear. Splattered across the number were specks of red, tainting the fragile skin with the aftermath of war.

"Happy birthday~," sang a sinister voice. I couldn't muster the strength to look at the speaker. My eye was too fixated on the blood and gore before me. As the smoke dispersed, I saw remnants of the rest of the little bodies that were once behind me, following me like loyal little soldiers in the midst of war. The tears overflowed and never stopped. My voice was replaced with a scream of agonizing pain and suffering. In the span of no more than five minutes, I lost one hundred and fifty-four people that meant the world to me.

I looked up and saw what looked like an angel before me. My vision lied, for the angel of grace and purity I saw was a false apparition. What stood before me was an akuma, one that resembled that of a fallen angel. How befitting for a monster who tore the halos and wings from innocence itself less than two minutes ago. How befitting was it that the akuma resembled a child with eyes full of curiosity and naivety. It made me sick.

"Hmm? Why do you cry, Exorcist?" The false angel asked me.

"Why do you lie, Akuma?" was all I could say in response. The child from hell smiled mockingly at me and placed a hand on my cheek. I couldn't move. I didn't want to. To die would be a great honor for someone who failed both of the lifestyles they were torn between.

"We akuma do not lie," said the fallen angel,"For that is the smallest of the sins we could possibly carry." _Lying is the greatest of the sins I've carried on my shoulders. _It was then that I wondered how cruel the life of an akuma was. How sinister was it to die by living among the living? I would hope to never know.

I couldn't possibly carry that much pain on my fallen wings.

* * *

><p>"Lavi, run!" A voice called to me. I sat there in shock. I hadn't moved, but it felt like time itself had bent around me. Standing in front of me, bloodied and bruised was Allen Walker, shielding my being with the sword of his left arm.<p>

"W...What?"

"RUN!" He demanded. As fast as I could, I gathered my weary body away from the battlefield. It hurt to run, and just as I was falling I felt Komui's arms catch me in a firm grip. I looked back at Allen with a lifeless orb of deep emerald. He looked like he was sick, as if he saw a horrible ghost. I couldn't blame him. Akuma must have been scary beings to look at if he could see their souls. The white haired exorcist hesitated for a long moment as he stared into the heart of the akuma. Not long after, I saw him drop his weapon and fall to his knees. Tears glistened in his eyes as he doubled over in pain and nausea. The akuma - recently determined to be a level four - laughed at Allen and rubbed his back in mock comfort.

"What do you see, young Exorcist?" he asked as Allen relieved his stomach of the sickness he felt. He coughed and sputtered as he cried and puked. He shook in fear and horror and agony as he sat near the monster of the Earl.

"How... W-Why...?" Allen looked at the eyes of the akuma, and the akuma drifted a few feet away and smiled with false purity.

"It is life," he responded and laughed. Allen glared at the monster standing before us. I couldn't comprehend what was going on, but I could tell it wasn't very pleasant. Allen managed to stand himself up and grip his sword.

"I cannot forgive you, akuma..." He muttered with such fury,"The sins you bear are much too great for you to live any longer."

"Then lay us to rest, young child. Show us what it truly means to be an Exorcist."

The last thing I saw before I passed out was Allen letting his tears fall as he lunged at the level four akuma. I may not have seen what he did in the akuma's soul, but I know I wouldn't have wanted to.

_I couldn't possibly carry that much pain on my wings._

* * *

><p><strong>Whoo, finally done... Sorry I took so long to update. I wanted to wait till after school ended to post something way I would have more time to read reviews and update over the summer. :) I'm really sorry this is such a long chapter. This is the longest by far, haha! I also apologize if the ending of this chapter was confusing... Nonetheless, I hope you enjoy it. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE review and let me know what you thought of this chapter. I really would love to hear your thoughts. This is a really big kick in the plot, and I need to know if my writing is getting the point across... ;u; See you next time. Love you all!<strong>


	7. Author's Note

Hey! Remember me?

I'm really sorry I cut off Exponents at a really bad place. I didn't think it'd get to be this bad, but life kinda gave me a really bad wake up call as to how busy I would be.

However, hopefully I'll be able to change that by slowly getting back into the swing of things. I dunno if any of you still care to read my works, or even remember that I write, but I do have a new story up in conjunction with my friend Bambino-Rotto. It's a collection of Laven Drabbles that, if given enough love and attention, will be made into longer one-shots. It's slowly gotten me back into writing fanfiction and because of that I want to revive Exponents. I still love the story and the characters that came with it, so it really hurt when I let it fall into a long hiatus...

So in short, I will be coming back with new chapters of Exponents. I'd still love your reviews, and to those of you who still bother coming back to this story... Thanks a bunch. It really does mean a lot to me. (:


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